He's rare, so rare in fact, players spend hours searching for him. There are only a few great mysteries left in the world...Do UFO's steal cattle? Who shot JFK? Is the Loch Ness monster real? Does Bilge actually spawn on Xegony? Does he actually spawn on any server? Will my quest for really bad plate armor drive me insane? These questions and more are why we gather here....

Bilge News 01/30/00 : The Page is dead, thanks for all the fish.
Page News:
Its been about a year and a half since the last update. Gave up EQ a LONG time ago, spent some time in DAOC, and now mainly play single player games or Counter Strike. Thanks to all of you for the years of support. I'll keep the page up, incase it has worth to someone.

Arturum

Bilge News 09/28/00 : Sorry she's had me tied up, ouch, updated finally.
Page News:
Been playing alot of EQ, working a bunch, and spending a lot of time with my girlfriend. Tonight I'm updating the spawn of the day, hopefully I'll get to some other stuff this weekend.

Bilge News 09/14/00 : GM EVENTS -- Waste of time? or not?
Page News:
I just spent about an hour wandering around Oasis looking for a "Returned One". This "oh so well planned" GM event was a total waste of my gaming time. A couple of guildmates got killed by some jacked up GM run spectres so of course the guild gathered and decided to rid the land of these foul beasts. Ok, so I get there and can't see them because rumor is my lvl is too high -- was playing a 52nd lvl Druid at the time -- I get one on track and follow it a bit, and still no GM. People the whole time are trying to talk to them, and get ANY kinda response. This of course didn't happen. Once in a while they would go nuts and kill someone. Basically it was a total FUBAR. I feel sorry for EQ if this the future we are heading into in GM events. This is the 2nd event I have been involved in, and while the last was better, this one left a bad taste in my mouth and a rant here on the page. Only thing that happened that I enjoyed? I heard a few people shout "MOVE I NEED A SHOT FOR THE BILGE HUNTER". Gotta love the power trip I felt there...

I'm also starting a new feature: Bilge Hunter Player of the Week. This section will feature some of the more "interesting" personalities of EQ. If you have someone who you think would make a good "Player of the Week" - Drop me and email with server and name. This weeks player of the week: Bakk Auff of Xegony. Interview to follow sometime Friday.

Until Later, Arturum

Bilge News 09/09/00 : Been Camping in HATE, Update to Guild Review
Page News:
First off I've added a poll: Are you a Member of a Guild? The Poll can be found HERE. This will give me some insight into the number of players in EQ currently in a guild. 

I updated the Guild Review page with my first review of the month, Havenlight of Xegony.

Been spending a lot of time camping for EM Armor in Hate, that combined with my new girlfriend has taken a lot of time away from the page. I'll try to get here more to update as things mellow out. 

Newsbite of the Week: How long will EQ survive?
I am looking forward to the upcoming expansion as much as the next person, and I hope that Verant plans on keeping EQ going for along time. On the other hand I tend to wonder if they can continue to keep the game interesting and fun for years to come. UO was a groundbreaking game, but I'll be the first to admit I bailed from the sinking ship as soon as Beta EQ came out. I think UO lacked a lot of the good features we find in EQ, but I wonder if the next big game will kill the EQ market like what happened to UO. Please feel free to post your thoughts on this in the Forum.

A thank you:
I'd like to thank the members of Cognatus of Xegony for all the aid in Hate getting Arturum almost a full set of Plane Armor. They are a fine group of people and a joy to be around.
 
Bilge News 09/03/00 : Been Camping, Updates to Guild Reviews and Pictures
Page News:
Been kinda busy lately, went camping for about 4 days in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. It was actually nice to get away from life and my computer for a few nights. I recommend it highly. 

In other news, I'm running low on shot for the page. Basically I'm looking for rares and spawns from the planes. Plane mobs most people don't get to see until late levels, or are just too busy trying to survive to actually look at them. 

I'm going to do the first review for the Bilge Hunter review page this weekend. I also added myself to the EQ Top 100 Links page, its kinda neat. It tracks the top pages and hits for those pages and ranks the top 100 sites...link to it is on the left.

For those of you that have been asking: I play a 51st lvl Cleric on Xegony. Enjoy the class alot, and am currently working on getting Plane armor for him. Oh, BTW thanks to Cunnan's Brewing Company for giving me a set of EM legs the other day. I logged into Hate for about 10 mins and got a pair...very cool thing to do, thanks gang. 

Bilge News 08/19/00 : New Newsbite Topic, Need more Shots!
Page News:
I'm moving the old newsbite topic, Dragons to the message boards in hope of opening some talk about it. I am also posting 2 letters I got there about it...link is HERE

Today's new shots are a few I found in the mail that I picked because I just really like them, color is great, angle is killer, etc. The GM Event was taken by Gwyn, a cleric in Jade Dragon, and a close friend. I know Lucan isn't rare, but damn he can be a fun kill, and man talk about a fun faction hit. Some of the older shots I have learned are really poor quality this is due to the fact, that when I was on the old server we decreased the image quality to speed up the page and save space...this is no longer an issue, and I'll be working on restoring these to their original quality. We have a backup thank god...

Finished adding the names to the shots, and as you can see Tenian is by far the man who seems to run into the rarest of the rare. A ranger on Bristlebane, I haven't gotten a shot from him in months...you still alive out there Tenian? He has submitted 25 shots. 

Speaking of shots: I am yet again running out of rares for the page...please send any you have! -- Thanks, Arturum

I'll try and update the "Hard to Kill" and guild review pages this weekend.

Newsbite of the Week: Guilds
My friend friend Div Devlin from over at Aerynth Atheneaum got me thinking tonight. After Slyfiend left me the Original Guild Review, I started looking for help. Div became one of my most trusted and hard working reviewers. He now has a site for the upcoming game Shadowbane, link is on the left. 

Anyway he sent me this link of an editorial about some of the older online gaming guilds out there, and get got me thinking about guilds in general. I've done a 180 in my thinking about large guilds in EQ since I started playing. I used to HATE the larger guilds on Xegony. Our Uberguilds, namely Inner Circle, used to control all the dragon and plane raids...At least thats what I thought, infact I've come to the idea that they don't control those raids, but infact they are the only ones able to do them. The name, Inner Circle, while still being a power on Xegony no longer brings acid and bile to my tongue. In fact I feel for them and the leadership of the larger guilds. Recently we added about 25 people to my own guild, Jade Dragon, and I'll tell you what, nothing is more exciting and fun in EQ then being able to hunt where you want, and when you want. Fires of Heaven is an other good example of a guild that many seem to hate, yet they are the main source of new item info in EQ. I'm interested in your thoughts on "uberguilds" and EQ. Feel free to post on the board or mail me.

You might get a laugh about this, I did....

This shows what one day on the EQvault does for a webpage like mine, click the chart:

I guess what I'm getting at is this, if you like one of the smaller sites, bookmark it and check it when you check your other daily's. Guys like myself and Graffe, don't do these pages just for our own egos (I have guildmates that would disagree on that one), or for our health. We enjoy feedback and having a place in the EQ community. In other words, just don't wait until you see a post on the Vault, before you read one of the minor sites...oh yea and use the damn click thru's -- heh

Bilge News 08/16/00 : The trap of Capitalism, backfires in my face.  Added a message board. Talked to a Lawyer...
Page News:
Well, about 3500 hits today! Nice, I'm happy, so I check my new advertising account to see the Phat Ca$h that must have rolled in. $.80 cents! woohoo. Yea ok, its kinda funny. So much for that idea. All I ask is if you like the site, hit the damn click throughs, if you hate it BITE ME.

In other news, I talked to Steve Segal Lawyer on the phone tonight, thank Brell for my message machine and its auto record function. This is a transcript:

Arturum: Hello?

Lawyer for Steven Segal (LSS): Hello Mr. Arturum, can I call you Art?

Arturum: umm, no -- who is this?

LSS: Art, my name is Jack Hoban, I am the legal council for Steven Segal. I'd like to talk to you tonight about his image on your web page, the Bilge Hunter. 

Arturum: Umm, how did you get this number?

LSS: My client worked for the Agency, we have our ways...Let me get to the point Art, we are concerned with you using Steven's image on the Bilge Hunter. My client believes that he should be getting some sort of compensation for this. 

Arturum: ahh, what did you have in mind?

LSS: Hold on let me check with him.....(long pause)....He wants to know if Lower Guk is camped right now...

Anyone have an SSOY for trade?

I'll be adding a few guild reviews tonight, and hopefully adding some more to the "Hard to Kill" page. I figured we needed a place to post and talk smack, so I added an EZboard to the page, link is HERE or on the left. Also you will note I'm now started adding who took the shots of the rare spawns. Those will be done ASAP.

Think I better clear some stuff up for the new viewers of the page, this might lessen the amount of mail on this I'm getting. I started the Hunter, during my search for Bilge. I must have been about level 35-40 at the time, and I wanted that damn breastplate. At the time it was kind of a joke site, and I didn't think it would mutate into what it has become today. Somewhere along the line I started posting shots of rare spawn, and well 100+ shots later you see where we are. I try not to post spoilers to rares locations, but the new "hard to kill" section will cover tactics on those really nasty mobs out there. I'm going to be really liberal on the boards, if you are looking for spawn info try there, prolly someone will help you. 

Bilge News 08/15/00 : Well I fell into the trap of Capitalism.
Page News:
I've kept my sites Ad free for 3 years, and thinking about it last night I decided that it would be best to add some advertising to the page. This will help keep me motivated to keep updating. I joined Hamster.com, and hopefully it will pay off, I'm going to give them 2 weeks. If I don't see my little online bank account growing, I'll dump them and move to someone else. So I'm asking the fans of the page to take a second and click the left bar stuff with the little hamster on it. Hopefully this can help me pay some of my hosting server bills. I owe them a bit of cash...(if you don't see anything down there, hit refresh, their damn Java tends to wig out and disappear)

Bilge News 08/14/00 : "Hard to Kill" Goes Live, and some design work.
Page News:
Check out Steven Segal and "Hard to Kill" EQ Spawns HERE. Also as you can see I've changed some fonts on the page, and am trying to give the site that "pro" look. Also added a few nice little Java items to hopefully make using the page more simple. Hope you like it.

Bilge News 08/14/00 : Steven Segal joins the Staff!
Page News:

I got a phone call last week from Steven Segal's agent, we wanted to set up an interview with me and Mr. Segal. I guess Steve is a huge EQ player, and he really wanted to get involved with my work here on the Bilge Hunter. Steve and I met in San Jose, CA Sunday afternoon. This is basically what went down: Arturum: Wow, Mr. Segal nice to meet you. I've really enjoyed your work in the past, can I call you Steve? SS: No. Arturum: So, Steve, with your successes in the movies why would you want to get involved with an EQ Fansite?

SS: Well several things have happened to me in the last few weeks, Jackie Chan smears me all over SNL, Kelly Labrock, my wife, and star of "Wierd Science" leaves me for that pastry humper from "American Pie". The only thing I have in my life anymore is my movies and EQ.

Arturum: Come on, Steve, since "Under Siege 2" your movies have kinda gone downhill admit it man...

SS: I'll break you, you little mother fu.....

Well you get the idea of our meeting, Steve needed a job, and to be honest I could use the help. So Steve is going to be the host of a new feature for the Bilge Hunter: Casey Rybecks "Hard to Kill" Spawn. Casey will be bringing you the top 10 of hard to kill EQ spawn, and how to defeat them! Look for it tonight later! 

Bilge News 08/11/00 : Update to Hunter, Guild Reviews, EQ News
Page News:
I've decided to have a bit of a format change, as you can see from the page. Back in the day I used to run a web site called "The Ultima Online Guild Review". The idea of the page was simple, review and rate guilds from their web pages. At the time most people discovered guilds from the info on the web, not in game as in EQ. Things have changed, now most people in EQ are meeting people before they even know about a guild site. The lack of a solid guild index is amazing. 

Therefore I'm bringing back the dead "Guild Review" as an extension of The Bilge Hunter. I will be reviewing one guild a week, writting a short paragraph about the page and rating it on a 1-10 scale. More info will be on the guild review page, which I will start after I get a guild to submit themselves for review.. Check out Bilge Hunter Guild Review HERE.

I will continue to update the Hunter with Rare Spawn shots, but to be honest I'm running out of new shots and people just aren't submitting many. To keep up interest in the page I'm also adding choice "sound bites" of news effecting the EQ world, with my own thoughts on that news. I'm hoping to stir up the pot a bit and get some choice input back from you , the player. 

Newsbite of the Week: Dragons

This week the following patch message came to us all from our friends at Verant.

"Rumor has it that some new dragons have been spotted in Kunark. It should be noted however that the dragons can be engaged from much further away than is intended. Rather than hold off implementing these dragons for another week, we've decided to implement them now and fix the problem in the next patch. Enjoy"

This as we all know is an attempt to solve the ongoing debate on the level cap for Nagafen and Vox, but is it really going to solve the problem or just cause more. I've done my share of killing (and being killed by) Dragons, and I thought the level cap was a huge mistake. 

I come from an old school role playing back ground, pen and paper. In a role playing game (not a CRPG mind you) a dragon was a huge undertaking, often resulting in the deaths of many (much like EQ). Dragon hunting usually involved huge quest to find the dragon, find its weakness, large amounts of travel and the eventual hunt of the beast. Varant in my opinion has really missed the boat on Dragons. Vox as we all know is found inside Permafrost, Nagafen in Sol B. Both were and are fairly easy to get to. There is no research needed to discover a weakness or a quest to find a powerful weapon to fight a dragon with. 

Dragon hunts are therefore reduced to this: Uberguild A decides to kill the dragon on Blank Day (any day after a patch). They all gather at a set time, and pull the Giants. Killing the dragon becomes a simple task with the proper knowledge and people to do it. Loot is passed out and everyone goes about their normal gaming. 

I hoped with Veeshan's Peak things would change, as a quest was involved to get into the zone. Unfortunatly VP has become basically the same as the original Vox-Nag raids, with only the most powerful guilds getting the chance to hunt there. 

I feel sorry that EQ has been reduced to a "join uberguild A or don't raid" game. Now I'm not saying that you can't do a raid without being in an uberguild, what I am saying is most of the Dragons are killed by large guilds, with many people left out. I was hoping the intent of everquest was QUESTING. As we all know most of the quests in the game blow froglok slime. I'd like to see a long involved quest to find a dragon, a dragon killable by a much SMALLER group of people, something like this:

Six players gather to discover the secrets of the mythical dragon, Arturmus. (heh, I know but I HAD to name it that) They travel the world seeking clues of the whereabouts of this beast only to discover that the dragon must be summoned from the Plane of Sky by the Avatar of Veeshan herself (Long side quest follows involving finding Veeshan and doing quest for her). Eventually the heros are able to summon and kill Arturumus, and are rewarded (perhaps with titles?). The unfortunate side effect of this? The heros discover they are now hated in Rivervale, the town the dragon protects, and one member of the party, a halfling rogue, finds a magic ring that he just can't seem to get rid of (Props to J.R.R. Tolken, the master of the dragon quest). 

Impossible you say? I'd like to hear your thoughts on the idea. Mail me HERE.

Just my thoughts, Arturum

Bilge News 06/01/00 : I'm not Dead...Yet!
Been a while since I got around to an update. As usual I tend to flake a bit. But since its 4am and I can't seem to sleep....

I do need some more shots from Kunark, most of the ones you see here have been taken by myself or guildmates. Of course I keep forgetting to take a shot of that DAMN NO CLERIC ARM DROPPING OSTIARY in Sebilis. I swear I'm going to get those arms someday. Maybe I need to change the page to Ostiary Hunter....Anyone know what the heck and Ostiary is?

I think I just have problems with green colored spawn. Bilge -- Green , Ostiary -- Green. You know if there was a Great Green Dragon with something I needed, I'd never get it. ARGH!

My cleric has been moving along nicely in levels. Made the big 49, and am almost to 50. Only 20 billion EXP behind most of my guild. I don't know why I level so damn far behind my friends. 

Anyway....send those Kunark Shots in!

Bilge News 05/20/00 : Misc. Shots without Thumbnails
I'm adding a few backfiles over the next week, just to clear some space out on my drive. These are shots mainly from the "old" lands that have yet to make Spawn of the Week on the left side. Many of them are still pretty rare. 

Bilge News Archive Nov 99 - May 2000