Solo Self-Found

NOTE: this is a work in progress. Please add to it. At the risk of breaking the third-party wiki style, I will note that I am currently doing a SSF playthrough and finding many of these resources as I go. I'm sure you're more knowledgeable about EverQuest than me, so please share that knowledge. I figure there should be a single point where it can be compiled instead of scouring forum posts and reddit. Thanks. -Flans

Solo Self-Found (or SSF) is an optional, self-imposed ruleset which sees slight variation from one player to another. However, the two main tenets are:

• Solo only (grouping is forbidden)
• Self-found items only (trading with other players is forbidden)

Most also forbid buffs, heals, and ports from other players, making small exceptions for things such as getting a bind or finding a lost corpse. Some may go red by turning in the Tome of Order and Discord, which forbids any beneficial spell, including bind. Another common rule is to disallow purchasing items from vendors that were sold to that vendor by other players (i.e. only items which vendors have infinite copies of can be purchased). Others still may extend the rules to also encompass hardcore/permadeath. Each playthrough is one's own to shape.

There have been many threads on the official forums, P99 forums, Reddit posts, YouTube videos, and more where better information than is contained in this article is discussed. Additional information should be added so that this article can be used by players looking for tips to progress in a SSF run. This article presumes a high level of familiarity with the game and is not intended for beginners.

The Basics - What's the Point?

There is no in-game achievement system, and as such there are no real tangible rewards to be reaped from SSF other than a personal sense of accomplishment and perhaps mild bragging rights. In fact, as SSF strategies will fall far below optimal experience or coin gained without the restrictions, it could be seen as costing one in the form of time spent. However, as many have spent thousands of hours in EverQuest doing everything from grouping at low levels in Crushbone to raiding at high levels in Temple of Veeshan, SSF encourages players to go off the beaten path and find new alternative ways to level and farm. For instance, traditional wisdom may encourage newbies to scrape together some starting coin by farming silks or skins to sell to other players, but when vendors will pay a few mere gold for even high-quality skins, one is left to find alternate means to make money. Moreover, even with coin, what is there to buy from vendors that can lead to progress? As a result, new value can be found in items previously thought of as vendor trash. In short, the objective of SSF is to find a new way to play a game where most players have left few stones unturned.

Character Creation

Race

While the drawbacks to being an "evil" race can normally be circumvented or ignored entirely, in a SSF run this handicap will be more pronounced, reducing access to boat travel and many of the best quests for soloable gear.

Iksar

You will spend a lot of time regenerating between fights. Iksars' bonus HP regeneration can significantly reduce downtime. Iksar characters also get a bonus +15 AC (+17 for Warriors).

Troll

You will spend a lot of time regenerating between fights. Trolls' bonus HP regeneration can significantly reduce downtime.

Class

Some classes are better suited for soloing than others. For example, Necromancers are commonly viewed as a very capable soloing class, and unsurprisingly make for a great SSF candidate. However, as the objective for most exploring SSF tends to be a new challenge, many may avoid easily-soloed classes like the Necromancer, Magician, and Druid. Some classes have quests which are (eventually) easily soloed, such as the Crafted Armor quests for Warriors, or Totemic Armor for Shamans. These quests should be considered when selecting a class for SSF. All are encouraged to add notes to each individual class section.

Necromancer

No other class can match the Necromancer's ability to solo even high level nameds. Throw in a pet to tank for you and strong self-regen options between lifetaps and the lich line and you have arguably the most capable SSF class.

Ranger

Able to wear up to some plate armor, self-healing and self-buffing, snare for kiting - Rangers are a great all-around class well-suited to SSF.

Rogue

Seen as one of the worst classes overall even without the limitations of SSF, with one of their greatest strengths (Backstab) being mostly inaccessible while soloing, Rogue is something of a masochistic choice.

Paladin

A tank that can self-heal and find easy farming spots with their advanced damage vs undead.

Notes

Starting stat distribution will vary highly from class to class, and since gear will be largely restricted overall, special care should be placed into starting stats. For instance, there are |reportedly breakpoints in charisma at 62 and 76. All Gnomes (other than Enchanters) start with a base 60 charisma. Normally, putting points into charisma is inadvisable, but it may be worth considering spending those two extra points to get the better vendor prices when taking into account how often you will be buying from and selling to vendors. (More testing should be performed to determine precisely how CHA affects vendor prices.)

Equipment

Weapons

• Tarnished Weapons are cheap and easy to make, provided a vendor selling Sharpening Stones is easily accessible. They have increased ratio vs their rusty counterparts.

Magic Weapons

For melee classes, a solo-obtainable magic weapon will be important to find. Below is a (non-exhaustive) list of magic weapons that can be soloed.

• Short Sword of Morin

  Short Sword of Morin

  

  MAGIC ITEM LORE ITEM NO DROP
  Slot: PRIMARY SECONDARY
  Skill: 1H Slashing Atk Delay: 22
  DMG: 6
  STR: +3 AGI: +3
  WT: 3.0 Size: MEDIUM
  Class: RNG
  Race: HUM ELF HEF HFL
  
  (0.2727 ratio) can be soloed by Rangers with sufficient Fletching to make silver-tipped arrows and snare-kiting the level 27 Ghoul Messenger.
• Bone Bladed Claymore

  Bone Bladed Claymore

  

  MAGIC ITEM LORE ITEM
  Slot: PRIMARY
  Skill: 2H Slashing Atk Delay: 45
  DMG: 17
  AGI: -8
  WT: 10.0 Size: LARGE
  Class: WAR PAL RNG SHD
  Race: ALL
  
  (0.3778) drops from a level 15 A shadowknight (Troll) in Befallen.
• Bloodforge Hammer

  Bloodforge Hammer

  

  MAGIC ITEM LORE ITEM
  Slot: PRIMARY
  Skill: 2H Blunt Atk Delay: 50
  DMG: 13
  SV MAGIC: +10
  WT: 10.0 Size: LARGE
  Class: ALL except BRD ROG NEC WIZ MAG ENC
  Race: ALL
  
  (0.26) comes from the Trumpy Irontoe quest. While this can be completed at fairly low levels (Trumpy is only level 5), it will require a fairly perilous journey across the breadth of Antonica to go from Qeynos, to kill Trumpy, all the way to Freeport to take the boat towards Kaladim and turn in his head. Additionally, it should be noted that it will result in a heavy hit to the Circle of Unseen Hands, the Qeynos Rogue's guild (as well as more manageable hits to Kane Bayle and Corrupt Qeynos Guards.
• Langseax

  Langseax

  

  MAGIC ITEM
  Slot: PRIMARY SECONDARY
  Skill: 1H Slashing Atk Delay: 23
  DMG: 6
  WT: 4.0 Size: MEDIUM
  Class: WAR
  Race: ALL
  
  (0.2609) and
  Langseax of the Wolves

  Langseax of the Wolves

  

  MAGIC ITEM LORE ITEM
  Slot: PRIMARY
  Skill: 2H Slashing Atk Delay: 44
  DMG: 19
  STR: +5 DEX: +5
  WT: 9.5 Size: LARGE
  Class: WAR
  Race: ALL
  
  (0.4318) can be soloed in the 20s.
• Dragoon Dirk

  Dragoon Dirk

  

  MAGIC ITEM LORE ITEM
  Slot: RANGE PRIMARY SECONDARY
  Skill: Piercing Atk Delay: 23
  DMG: 6
  DEX: +2
  SV MAGIC: +3
  WT: 2.5 Size: SMALL
  Class: ALL except CLR PAL DRU MNK SHM
  Race: ALL
  
  (0.2609) is an ultra rare drop from Dorn B`Dynn (mid-teens) in North Ro. It drops more reliably from Ambassador DVinn (level 20) in Crushbone.
• Glowing Wooden Crook

  Glowing Wooden Crook

  

  MAGIC ITEM
  Slot: PRIMARY
  Skill: 2H Blunt Atk Delay: 35
  DMG: 11
  WT: 8.5 Size: LARGE
  Class: ALL except ROG NEC WIZ MAG ENC
  Race: ALL
  
  (0.3143) from Lockjaw (25) in Oasis.
• Fang of the Wolf

  Fang of the Wolf

  

  MAGIC ITEM
  Slot: EAR PRIMARY SECONDARY
  Skill: Piercing Atk Delay: 26
  DMG: 5
  WT: 2.0 Size: MEDIUM
  Class: WAR ROG SHM
  Race: BAR TRL OGR IKS
  
  (0.1923) can be obtained from the Gnoll Fur quest in Halas' Rogue's guild. Requires 64 Patch of Gnoll Fur (which drops from mobs starting around level 5) and a small amount of tailoring practice (final combine reportedly trivial at 31).

Armor

Tailoring makes for fairly smooth progression in AC: a full set of patchwork/tattered is a reasonable and affordable goal for anyone starting out, with studded being a bit more expensive as it requires Blacksmithing (which is much more expensive to level). If able to wear Fine Plate, low quality pelts can be combined with Silk Thread to make Leather Padding, a requisite component of the considerably-high trivial blacksmithing recipes. However, consider that a high trivial combine can still be completed in a few tries, which will usually be cheaper than levelling a tradeskill high enough to make the combine without failures.

Bags

Tailored Large Bag

Tailored Large Bag

QUEST ITEM
WT: 0.8 Weight Reduction: 10%
Capacity: 6 Size Capacity: LARGE

s are easy enough to craft while levelling tailoring, though offer only minor weight reduction and are only 6-slot.

Making Money

• Wolves, cats, bears, and spiders are plentiful in all corners of Norrath. Ruined pelts don't stack and are heavy, which can require frequent trips to a vendor. However, carrying a stack of tailoring patterns and a sewing kit can reduce this weight significantly by creating a patchwork/tattered piece of armor (masks are the lightest at 0.4). Additionally, with 75 CHA and at least indifferent faction, a ruined pelt sells for 9c. Recipes cost 5s 2c, and a piece of patchwork/tattered armor sells for 1g 4s 2c, leading to a profit of 8s 1c once tailoring is sufficiently levelled.
• Fishing requires a platinum or so to get started with, as as low levels a repeated investment of ~2g is necessary to replace broken rods. However, bait is cheap (with Fishing Grubs making it an even cheaper option for foraging race/class combinations) and the things it catches will sell at a profit.
• Farming
  Bone Chips

  Bone Chips

  

  WT: 0.1 Size: SMALL
  Class: ALL
  Race: ALL
  
  outside of Kaladim can be turned in to quickly and easily make a few starting gold.
• Delivering mail for the Lague of Antonican Bards can generate more than 1p for a < 10 minute round trip between Felwithe and Kelethin.

Miscellaneous Notes

• There used to be a bug which allowed one to Bind Wound during combat. This has been patched.
• This forum post has a lot of very good notes.