Sony's inclusion of TCG's (Trading Card Games) in a number of their titles have drummed up a bit of controversy in their respective game communities, and EverQuest is no different. A new dungeon called the Dragon Brood Crypt is being gated by a "Dragon Brood Crypt Key" loot card from the Legends of Norrath EverQuest TCG, and this is causing a bit of a stir within the game's community.

Producers Craig "Grimwell" Dalrymple and Thom Terrazas respond to players' concerns:

Craig & Thom's take:

The EQ LON card in question is called “The Dragon Brood Crypt Key Loot Card”

When you redeem it your character will get a quest that tells them where to go and what to do in order to gain access to a small private instance zone. Access to the zone requires that one person holds the key; they can bring a group with them and nobody else is required to have the key.

While in the zone the group will be able to go through the quest that is triggered by this item that concludes with rewards typical for LON as well as an item for the group members to roll for. I do not have information on those items currently. The zone is designed for a group of Level 85 characters.

Provided that the last steps in this zone are not completed, the key holder can access the zone multiple times with anyone they are grouped with. Individual group members do not have to have a copy of the key to go in with a friend who does. The content and rewards, outside of those provided in the last step are trivial, so the private instance can’t be farmed for reward.

Once the last step is completed and the final rewards are claimed, the key is consumed and the zone will be inaccessible to the key holder.

The key can only be obtained through LON, and while I don’t know the rarity on it, people who have multiple copies of the loot item can run through the instance and receive the final rewards one time for each copy of the key they have.

I know that some of you have more questions, but this should answer the larger ones and give you a fuller picture of what this loot card will do. Thanks again for your patience and understanding while this information was gathered.

Emotions continue to run high in the ongoing discussion thread on the announcement, which you can view here.