Holly Longdale itemizes the timeline for Altar of Malice.

Holly "Windstalker" Longdale, EverQuest II's Senior Producer, posted a Producer's Letter which itemilzes not only the update schedule for September through November, 2014, but the entire timeline for the launch of Altar of Malice, EverQuest II's 11th expansion!

Here's the important dates for Altar of Malice:

• Limited Beta (All Access Members): October 7
• Open Beta: October 14
• Preoder dates: none
• All Access member purchase and play date: November 11
• Launch date for everyone: November 25

For more details about the expansion and the complete update schedule for the next three months, see the entire letter below or check it out on the official forums.

Greetings Norrathians,

We’re all charged up and busy after a great time at SOE Live! The team is hunkered down and focused on the expansion, fixes, and updates on the schedule. Here are some details!

When is the EverQuest II: Altar of Malice Beta?

On Oct. 7 we will launch Limited Beta for All Access members. Most of the content will be focused on the Overlands and level increase content. We need your support!

Oct. 14 will be Open Beta for everyone. We’d love you to come check out the content and help us make sure it’s good, clean fun.

When is Altar of Malice Launch?

The expansion launch for All Access members will be on Nov. 11, just a few days after we celebrate our 10th anniversary!

On Nov. 25, the expansion will be available to everyone.

When can I buy the expansion?

It’s a bit different this year as we aren’t having a pre-order period. If you are an All Access member, you can buy and play the expansion on Nov. 11.

If you’re not a member, you can purchase it on Nov. 25 and gain access to the expansion.

Prices haven’t been determined yet, but we’ll let you know soon!
What is included in the expansion?

Here’s the overview:

·Level 95-100 Adventurer and Tradeskill levels
·Level 95-100 Adventurer and Tradeskill Prestige Abilities
·Level 95-100 Grandmaster spells/combat arts
·Rare Ancient Spell scrolls to Level 100
·Over 100 quests
·Level 95-100 Tradeskill quests
·New Tradeskill Recipes
·Lots and lots of loot!
·14 heroic zones
·6 raid zones
·6 advanced solo zones
·2 Contested zones
·2 Overlands
·4 new Avatars of the Gods raids

What isn’t included in the expansion?

The new player race -- the Aerakyn -- is what we call a “live” feature and not included in the expansion. Everyone can access the new race on Nov. 11. Like the Freeblood race, it is a separate purchase. We aren’t settled on the pricing yet, but we’ll share that info as soon as it’s available. The Aerakyn player race comes with built-in wings that become a flying mount at level 85 as well as custom wing-attack animations too!

Guild Level 100 is another live feature that's available to everyone which will come with upgraded amenities.

Will there be a Collector’s Edition?

Yep, we are working on the awesome stuff we want to package together right now to make it memorable and special.

What’s coming in the Update schedule?!

Here’s the schedule we have at the moment. During late September through November, we’ll be adjusting our weekly content update schedule with a few breaks so we can focus on the expansion beta and launch:

·September

oSept 9: PvP Deathmatch Zone: Balance of Theer

oSept 16: Broker anywhere for All Access members

oSept 23: Performance Updates. This includes code updates that have shown performance improvements in the player clients and servers. (For details, see Dave “Maevianiu” Kish’s and Douglas “Endymion” VanDerveer’s posts in the Beta Server Updates thread: https://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/index.php?threads/beta-server-updates.550828/#post-6096895)

oSept. 30: 5 Level-Agnostic Dungeons & Grandmasters released!

·October

oOct. 1: Friends and Family Beta

oOct. 7: All Access Beta Begins

oOct. 9: Nights of the Dead begins

oOct. 14: Open Beta begins

oOct. 21: Send/Receive email attachments anywhere (All Access Only)

·November

oNov. 7: Heroes’ Festival launch

oNov. 8: EverQuest II’s 10th Anniversary!

oNov. 9: Tenth Anniversary Veteran Reward: Isle of Refuge Prestige home

oNov. 11: Altar of Malice Expansion Launch for All Access members

oNov. 25: Altar of Malice Expansion Launch for all

Lots of stuff coming! We’ll be sharing more details as we go along too, from expansion lore to feature details in articles and EQ2 Insider.

We can’t wait to see you in game!

 Amy "Calthine" Lanam, ZAM Content Manager