EverQuest Legends DevStream: Dungeon Crawls, Nektropos,Kunark, Epics and more.
9/18/2026 - There are few things more appropriate for an EverQuest Legends developer stream than watching somebody willingly walk into Kedge Keep, owning the place and taking the viewers along for the ride. The September 18 EQL Insights stream was one of the most relaxed and free-ranging the Game Jawn team has done in a while. This time, they had a little extra help. Creator Legend BrutallStatic joined Jeff “Seitoko” Godisart and Brasse for a proper dungeon crawl. Do not let this jolly bunch fool you, there was a ton of information to share, and Brutall proved why he uses that name as he brought the tough EQL questions for Seitoko.
“We're going to be tackling the dungeon crawl system.”
-Seitoko
That made this stream particularly fun to watch because we actually got to see the Dungeon Crawl system in action, where the devs were dealing with the same things players will deal with, including inventory management, figuring out what counts toward completion, looking at loot and, of course, killing things that probably should have been left alone. As I went over all the loot we as viewers received in the form of insider information, I wonder if this format potentially lowered Seitoko's guard, revealing more insight into the design process and things to come.
And while the dungeon crawl itself was supposed to be the main focus of the show, the stream turned into one of those typical EverQuest Legends information dumps where you start with one question and suddenly find yourself talking about Kunark, class balance, Beastlord pets, trade skills, server transfers, marketplace gifting and a mysterious new thing called artes.
So grab your bags, make sure you have room for loot, and let's head into the dungeon.
So, What Exactly Is a Dungeon Crawl?
For those who have not put their hands on this new system yet, a dungeon crawl is a new way to run instances.
When a Dungeon Crawl begins, the player or group gets their own personal instance of the dungeon, just like before. However the big difference is that the creatures inside do not simply respawn while you are working your way through the zone. This was there before but the team spent time and effort sprucing it up to make it worth your while beyond using the feature as a zone exploration tool. Instead, the game now tracks your progress through a dedicated interface in the quest and task area.
The basic idea is pretty straightforward. You need to defeat a certain number of creatures to reach the required percentage of completion, while also hunting down specific rare or named creatures. Once both requirements have been satisfied, the Dungeon Crawl is complete and you receive a substantial additional bonus reward.
That sounds simple enough, but watching it play out in Kedge Keep showed why the system is more interesting than simply turning an old dungeon into a checklist. You are still exploring the zone, figuring out what you need to kill, keeping an eye on the tracker and deciding how much more time you want to spend inside.
No task too small.
As the crawl was underway, Brutall pointed out that you should go ahead and kill even the little fish you encounter. Despite their low level and xp, these smaller fish throughout the zone still count toward the Dungeon Crawl's percentage requirement and they are relatively quick kills.
When you are actually trying to finish a crawl, knowing which creatures contribute to your progress can make the difference between wandering around wondering what you missed and getting the job done. It also gives us a glimpse into how players will eventually learn the little tricks of each Dungeon Crawl. You may go into Kedge Keep the first time simply trying to survive. The second time, you know the fish count. The third time, you are probably running around with a much better idea of what you need to accomplish and get the most rewards out of your trip.
The Dungeon Crawl tracker is doing quite a bit of work behind the scenes. It shows your overall percentage progress, while also keeping track of the named or rare creatures that are still required. That means you can get a pretty good idea of whether you are actually close to completing the crawl or whether you still have some serious dungeon tourism ahead of you.
There was also an interesting discussion about whether the tracker should actually tell players the names of the creatures they still need to find. From a purely practical standpoint, listing everything would certainly make the system easier. But there is an argument for leaving some of that information for players to discover. EverQuest has always had a certain amount of exploration built into it. Sometimes the fun is knowing you need to find something without having the game immediately point an arrow at its exact location. The developers appear to be considering that balance rather than simply assuming more information is always better.
This loot is bonus
As you defeat enemies you will receive loot, from trash to valuable, however completing the required objectives for the crawl gives you additional bonus rewards. It is important to note here that even though you only need the minimum requirements done, the loot is connected to the creatures you killed during the crawl. In other words, the things you choose to fight can have an impact on what is available in that bonus loot pool. Reaching 100 percent does not necessarily mean you have to immediately pack your bags and leave. You can continue killing creatures after you have reached the formal completion requirement, and those additional kills can contribute to the bonus loot pool before you take out the final named mob
That creates an interesting choice for players. Do you finish the crawl and get out, or have you already done most of the work and decide to stick around for a little longer to see what else you can pull into the loot pool? Anyone who has ever said, “One more room and then we leave,” knows exactly how this is going to go.
No, One Bad Loot Roll Does Not Steal Another
There was also a useful clarification about how the bonus loot rolls work. The individual bonus items roll independently. So if something like a Plane of Sky key appears in the bonus loot, it does not mean that item has somehow replaced another potentially useful reward. Instead each item gets its own roll.
The team is aware that some items may not feel particularly exciting as bonus rewards, and Seitoko indicated that filtering out certain undesirable items, such as keys, could be something they look at.
Again, this is one of those little details that becomes much more important once thousands of players start running the system and discovering what feels good and what feels like inventory clutter.
“Has someone been reading my notes?”
-Seitoko
Three hours to make it back home
There is currently a three-hour time limit on a Dungeon Crawl instance . That makes sense for keeping instances under control, but it also creates an interesting problem when you start talking about some of the bigger EverQuest zones.
Not every dungeon is the same size. Places such as Kedge Keep and Plane of Hate are one thing. Start talking about places like Sebilis, The Hole and other larger zones, and suddenly three hours can become a serious commitment. With only 3 hours there is no room to come back tomorrow. The developers recognize that issue and are looking at ways to eventually preserve crawl progress for longer than the current instance window. That is not being presented as a finished feature, but it was clear that this is something the team wants to solve. Because the last thing anyone wants is to spend two and a half hours crawling through a giant dungeon, only to realize that real life has arrived and you have to log off.
Dungeon Tinkering
The team is also watching how long Dungeon Crawls actually take. That is important because the developers do not appear to be treating the current requirements as permanently carved into stone. The same goes for the encounters in the dungeons. Some zones have creatures that make perfect sense as required targets. Others may have rare or unusual creatures that are useful for loot or Motes but perhaps do not make sense as mandatory completion requirements. Befallen's Boondin Babbinsbort came up as an example of the sort of creature the team may need to reconsider when looking at what actually counts toward completion.
Similarly the team is looking at each required kill count. A number that feels reasonable in one dungeon may be completely unreasonable in another. The developers are gathering completion-time information and player feedback so they can make those adjustments based on how the system actually plays.
What About Outdoor Dungeon Crawls?
The current Dungeon Crawl system was designed around dungeon layouts, Long hallways, doors, traps , that sort of thing where you can get lost for a while. Outdoor Dungeon Crawls are not part of this first version. That does not mean the idea is dead. The team is open to exploring outdoor versions in the future, but there are clearly technical and design considerations involved in making an outdoor zone behave like an instanced dungeon crawl. For now, the focus is on getting the core system working well in the places it was originally designed to support.
Overall Dungeon Crawls are not being presented as the only way to play. They are another option that can run alone or with a group of friends. You can use them for progression, loot, Motes, exploration or simply because you want an excuse to go back into a classic zone without dealing with traditional respawn cycles. And because the developers are watching completion times, group sizes, loot results and player feedback, the system can, and likely will, continue to evolve.
BrutallStatic actually summed up that philosophy pretty well during the discussion. “It just adds another layer, just adds something else you can do in game and it gives you more choice.” That is probably the best way to look at Dungeon Crawls right now. They are not replacing traditional group play. They are not replacing raids. They are not turning every classic dungeon into an endgame challenge. They are adding another reason to go adventuring.
With the on-stream crawl in Kedge going swimmingly (pun intended) , Brasse read out many questions of the viewers from chat and discord and eventually handed the reins, carefully, to Brutall. Who wasted no time to dive right in with many questions from himself and his community. Lets go over some the exciting information shared.
"I don't know if or when we show the horrors of difficulty five."
- Seitoko
Dark Half-Elf: The First New Race Confirmed
Not to further bury the lead here, the new race has been announced. Observant players who had spotted clues in existing content coming from Gamescom, had apparently already figured it out. For everyone else, Brasse confirmed that the first new race coming to EQL launching alongside Nektropos Castle is the Dark Half-Elf.
BrutallStatic pressed Seitoko on whether Nektropos is raid content , but Seitoko did not want to that far. The zone is not simply being treated as another traditional raid entered through a Voidling. Instead, the developers are looking at raid-like complexity and challenge, pushing the limits of EQL's character systems ,while creating something that fits the castle itself.
It is Rulers of Kunark, not Ruins of Kunark -Brasse
Permafrost Is Getting a Different Kind of Attention
Permafrost is confirmed coming after Nektropos Castle and Lake Neriuss are complete. The sequencing here is deliberate as some design learnings from the Nektropos work will directly inform the team on how Permafrost is built.
That is another example of why these streams are useful. We are not just hearing what is being built. We are hearing a little bit about how the developers are thinking about building it.
The design target for Permafrost is a leveling alternative to
Sol B for the high 30s to 40s range. This addresses a gap in EQL's mid-game that players have
been feeling and expressed themselves about quite commonly. The zone will be intended to be as complex as Nektropos. Instead it will be meant to
be played more like a classic EQ leveling zone that happens to escalate into something
exciting at the end.
It is Rulers of Kunark, and they are bringing epics
Speaking of things we now know, we also got another important clarification for EverQuest fans looking toward the next expansion. The name of the expansion will be "Rulers of Kunark" as opposed to the old "Ruins of Kunark" and is set during Kunark's prime, their golden years, where the empires were thriving and active. One of the big zones you can expect will be Sebilis, a major zone and a old favorite of many veteran player. But also expect new area, revamps and more to set this expansion apart from the original.
Brasse asked whether epic weapons were coming in with this expansion and Seitoko's answer was as on point as you can ask for: "We have epics coming in Kunark." Full stop. Brasse's responsed excitedly: "There we go. That's all we need to know."
For anyone who remembers what class epics meant in the original EverQuest, that is a pretty substantial statement. More information is coming but for now the message from Brasse was.. Hang tight.
A New System Teased and Immediately Locked Down
Community members noticed the word "Artes" in the
recent EQL producer letter and started asking about it on stream. Brasse's
response was essentially gleeful stonewalling,proclaiming "You'll have to wait and
see." And Seitoko confirmed that it's "pretty neat." That's all that was shared What a tease.
BrutallStatic was getting excited with that news and immediately bit down like a dog with a new chew toy, egging on Seitoko and Brasses to tell us more. This made the moment even more entertaining, but being professionals they are they did not give in.
What can be inferred though is that it is some sort of new skill system
significant enough to be mentioned in a producer letter and deliberate enough
to be kept quiet until a proper reveal. The name has no obvious precedent in
classic EQ so we eagerly will watch for an official announcement.
There were a lot of questions focused on gameplay and gameplay experiences people currently have and how they can be improved. Both Brutall, his community and the EQL community as a whole has many similar concerns, and wishes to keep their gameplay fun and fresh.
EverQuest Legends is designed to support different styles of play, and that means the developers have to think about what happens when two or three players enter content that might have originally been designed around a larger group.
The game already has scaling systems in raid content to prevent smaller groups from simply running into enormous health sponges. Dungeon Crawls may need similar tuning. Rather than simply making every creature stronger or weaker based on the number of players, the team is watching clear times and actual gameplay data. That should help answer an important question, does a small group feel challenged, or does it just feel like the same dungeon with an unnecessarily large pile of hit points?
Could Classic Zones Become Endgame Challenges?
Somewhat counter to the previous topic, the viewers in stream chat asked about the the idea of an empowered dungeon crawl concept, running old zones scaled up to level 50 with new challenges.
What happens if you take a familiar classic zone and make it significantly harder? Imagine something like Crushbone, but scaled into an endgame challenge. The concept is not confirmed as a Dungeon Crawl feature, but it is clearly an idea the team is thinking about.
Seitoko responded to the discussion with" Has someone been reading my notes?" That should probably tell us enough to keep an eye on the idea , without pretending that a new endgame Crushbone has been announced.
Instead this is one of the areas where the distinction between “the developers are considering this” and “this is coming” really matters. The idea is interesting to the team but it is not an announcement.
Rogue Poisons and Beastlord pets
Brutall also brought up some class-specific questions, including Rogue poisons and Beastlords
When asked if the Rogue's can get a little love in respect to their poisons, Seitoko elaborated that at present, Rogue poisons scale persistently from the lower levels through level 50. Higher-level poisons can also combine the effects of two different poisons. This is somewhat limiting but there is currently no confirmed system where poisons are ranked up in the same way spells are, although the idea is not necessarily off the table forever.
Backstab is another area that is receiving attention because it is such a fundamental part of the Rogue identity. The team has already been discussing changes to Backstab damage, although during the stream we were not presented with an insight this potential new Backstab system.
Once again, this is the kind of tuning that will likely continue as the team watches how the classes perform in actual gameplay.
Beastlord Pets are also under the microscope. The team has already made changes to the max-level Beastlord warder, but they are still checking the statistics and calculations behind pet potency. If the data shows that Beastlord pets are underperforming, further adjustments are possible. I am sure that fellow Beastlord players all agree, we are going to need some more dev love.
There has also been internal discussion about whether Beastlords could use another race's pet, but there is no confirmed implementation of that feature. So for now, consider that one firmly in the “the developers have talked about it” category.
Spellblade and Inversion Are Not Quite the Same Thing
Brutall brought up the fact that Spellblade and Inversion systems work differently even when they may appear similar on the surface and asked for a bit of a buff for the former. Seitoko pointed out that because Spellblade is passive, the team sees a reason for it to potentially be somewhat less powerful than something requiring active player involvement like Inversion. The developers have also been looking at interactions with spells whose cast times can move them outside the conditions required for Spellblade. Brutall pushed a little further asking for a 50%-100% increase for Spellblade to no concessions from Seitoko. Though it is another one of those features under the microscope, there was no giant “Spellblade buff incoming” announcement here. Instead, the team is looking at how the systems interact and whether they are producing the results they want. They will go from there.
Trade Skills Need More Than Just Another Recipe
Stay seated Trade Skillers, there are no major changes rolling out just yet. But take solace in the fact that this is an area where the team knows players want improvement. The current challenge is that there is no dedicated trade skills person on the team and changing trade skills can have consequences far beyond crafting itself. If you dramatically increase the power of crafted gear or make certain items too easy to produce, you can affect character progression, equipment balance and the in-game economy. As for the requests for quality-of-life suggestions, including automatic mass combining for things such as arrows. To Seitoko these ideas makes perfect sense from a player perspective. Nobody wants to spend their evening performing the same crafting combination hundreds of times. The problem is that there are technical hurdles involved, so there was no promise that automatic mass combining is coming immediately.
Server Transfers Are Being Investigated
Server transfers are another request that has been heard loud and clear. The developers know players want the ability to move characters so they can join friends rather than having to start over on another server. The technical feasibility of server transfers is being investigated, but there is no timetable to announce yet. That is yet another one to file under “being looked into,” rather than “coming soon.”
What About Marketplace Gifting?
Brutall spoke for many of us by pointing out that marketplace gifting is on many Wishlist's, and I suspect especially creators will immediately understand why. Imagine being able to purchase copies of the game, bags or other specific items and give them directly to community members as a thank you for their support. How about parents providing items or IR to their kids and keeping control over their credit card.
Seitoko agreed on the usefulness of this for creators who want to give things away and that many players look for this feature. The problem for now remains on the backend. Commerce systems and account ownership are not exactly the sort of thing you casually bolt onto a game over lunch. So again, the request is known, the usefulness is understood, but there is no immediate feature announcement.
Community rapidfire
As always with these there is too much to cover all in detail, so here is the usual rundown of questions and answers in short form. For more details please go watch the VOD's on the EverQuest Legends Twitch or YouTube channels.
Outdoor dungeon crawls: Not planned for the first iteration. The system works best with the hallway-and-camp structure of indoor dungeon zones. Not ruling it out long-term.
List of named creatures in the tracker: Possible but
not confirmed as a design decision. The minimap currently helps fill this gap
near completion. May arrive in a future UI update.
Progress saving past the 3-hour timer: Being evaluated.
Seitoko specifically cited Sebilis as the reason this matters. A multi-hour
Sebilis crawl would be inaccessible to players who can only play in 30-minute
sessions without a save feature.
Zone length and difficulty: Two solutions being pursued
in parallel for zones with very long clear times (Plane of Hate, The Hole):
reducing the scope required for completion, and enabling progress saves.
Lower Guk dungeon crawl: The team's most-cited problem
example. Two separate sides on different factions, high rare count across both.
Future DC updates will allow specific NPCs to be unflagged from the rare-for-DC
system.
Dungeon crawl-only loot: Seitoko has raised this
internally as an idea. Not confirmed, but it's "of some interest or
curiosity" and has been discussed.
Filtering trash from the bonus chest: Plane of Sky keys
and quest items appearing in the bonus chest is a known frustration. The team
is working on the ability to filter these. Standard trash mob drops are
intentionally included — restricting to named-only felt bad in testing.
Two-person scaling: The first step (scaling raid mob HP
for small groups) is already done. DC data now being used to tune 2–3 person
group experiences specifically.
Corrupted dungeons / permadeath modes: The team is
interested in alternate game modes broadly. No specific plan exists yet.
Class and Gameplay Questions
Charm mechanics (charisma): There are two separate
checks when charm could break. One is resistible based on magic resist vs.
spellcasting stats. The second is charisma-influenced and cannot be deleted —
even stacking significant negative magic resist via Overchannel doesn't remove
the charisma check. Charisma matters on both the initial cast and ongoing break
checks .
Beastlord warder vs. Shaman pet: The last pass targeted
the max-level warder specifically. If shaman pets are still parsing higher, the
next step is extending the stat adjustments down to lower-level warders for
consistency.
Cross-race Beastlord warders: Whether a Beastlord can
use a different race's warder pet after unlocking it has been discussed
internally. Team is curious about feasibility.
AoE balance (Bard DDD vs. other AoEs): BrutallStatic
raised the Bard DDD dominance question. Seitoko acknowledged the concern and
noted DDD is expected to fall off relative to classic content in Kunark. Nobody
on the stream was calling for a Bard nerf; the ask was for other AoE classes to
be more competitive.
Spellblade vs. Inversion: Passive (Spellblade) should
reasonably be less potent than active (Inversion). Recent fixes addressed
spells whose cast times were putting them outside Spellblade's proc range. Team
is watching it.
Rogue backstab Mote scaling: Confirmed as the next
major Rogue-focused change, per Secrets. Core class identity work.
QoL Items
Auto-skills not persisting between loadout swaps: Seitoko
said this is "probably pretty good" as something that can be fixed
and will raise it.
Item search (G key) filter by loadout: BrutallStatic
suggested filtering by your three active loadout classes simultaneously.
Seitoko: "I'm going to take that question back and I'm going to ask.
Because it's really useful in spells."
Server-select without closing the client: A task to
investigate this exists in the backlog.
Server transfers: Being investigated for technical
feasibility. No timeline.
Marketplace gifting: Seitoko raised this himself as
something he personally wants for creator giveaways. Significant back-end work
required.
Void Touch Potion stacking: You can carry three but
they don't stack to a single inventory slot. Seitoko flagged it as odd and will
ask.
Tradeskill auto-merge: Not having to click a combine
1,000 times to make 1,000 arrows. Aligns with EQL's philosophy; technical
complexity unknown. Will be looked at.
Final Thoughts
What I enjoyed most about this stream was that it felt like an actual EverQuest Legends play session rather than a cold corporate presentation. BrutallStatic was out there crawling through Kedge Keep and Plane of Hate with Seitoko, while questions from the community naturally pushed the conversation into other parts of the game under the guidance of Brasse. That gave us a much better look at how the team is approaching EverQuest Legends.
Between the Dark Half-Elf confirmation, the Artes tease, epics in Kunark, and the stack of QoL items that are now officially on Seitoko's radar, this stream quietly packed in more actionable information than its casual tone might suggest.
The team is hard at work on all fronts from new content, to balancing current content and addressing any outstanding issues. They are discussing class balance, trade skills, server transfers, future content and more. And sometimes they are simply saying, “We are looking into it.” That may not always sound exciting, but I actually think it is one of the more useful things a developer can say. Not every question has an answer yet, and pretending otherwise does not help anybody.
Nektropos is almost here, Permafrost is scoped and planned, Kunark is named and building, and the team is still very much in the business of making the game they want it to be. For now, Dungeon Crawls look like they could become a fun new way to experience EverQuest Legends, especially for players like me who enjoy exploring classic zones without needing to treat every gaming session like a military operation. Just remember the important stuff.
Kill the little fish in Kedge Keep and leave some room in your inventory.
DadGeek (Rob) is the co-founder of GeeksVsGeeks. He is a product of the eighties and never let go of his geek interest and hobbies no matter how often someone told him to stop. His love for gaming and all things geek has been part of his parenting style and permeates throughout the whole family. A family of Geeks vs Geeks
