Sky Breaker

January 18-21, 2008

Wow – yet another weekend marathon, and this time, a lot of good things happened! Also, a lot of non-Vana’diel activities too:

• Matt and Bran each win “People’s Choice” awards for their Scout Pinewood Derby cars – Matt got “Most Unusual” and Bran snagged “Funniest”. Patty said upon our arrival that she was looking forward to what we had come up with this year.
• Matt’s basketball team “The Wizards” won a nail-biter on a last-minute bucket. Final was 23-22 yet they were down 18-10 going into the fourth.
• TK and Rachel take a much-deserved win in Amazing Race 12.
• Green Bay loses to the Giants in OT on a 47-yard field goal from their kicker who missed two shorter tries in regulation.
• Spent MLK day out and about in Mandarin – lunch, the park, shopping, cleaning up Tyler…

Also put in like 15 hours and pulled off the following feats:

• Soloed the Beadeaux Crest run and soloed Oztroja up to the 4-lever door. I passed a 60PLD called Kaiji in Beadeaux in the Crest area of Qulun but wasn’t able to stick around and help. I got my crest and had to warp out because of aggro.

However, in Castle O, I saw him run by me headed to the second password statue as I was headed to #3. I told him both #1 and #2 to show him I was ahead. When I popped #3 I told him that one too. As I waited by the 4-lever door for the two Yags to be somewhere else, he comes running up and opens the door allowing me to pass. He doesn’t make it in and instead has to deal with aggro. I think for a moment about whether or not to help and ultimately decide that I must. I open the door and join him and we party up for the remainder of the castle.

Because of occasional aggro and a door snafu on my part we don’t reach the password trap door before midnight ><. He suggests going back but I tell him we need to just try passwords off the net, which actually works. We make it to the High Priest’s dais and are able to easily walk up and get our crests only getting aggro well after. I Escaped us and we split up, after much mutual thanking and respecting. I only died once to his twice but he seemed OK.

• I helped Taftpaul with one of the keys needed for the Kazham Airship pass, Giddeus. It didn’t take long and he was happy for the help, only finding me through shouts in Jeuno. He was very appreciative saying his LS wasn’t helping and I told him I didn’t mind because I like to help, hence being WHM.

• Shadee struck up a long convo with me just as I made my way to my MH hoping for a party. He said he was bored but it turns out he was flirting too. He called me out for my Bazaar comment once I had to let him know I was a dude IRL. Told him that comment was originally written assuming I’d be RPing. Also, it’s the one place I use a female description of my char – otherwise I’m not shy to admit my real gender if it comes up. Anyway we had a really nice chat. Now I just need to find him in-game and trade him a cookie. Oh yeah, he claims to have 594 DAYS in-game!

• Had a pair of major parties on WHM for about 7k and 12.5k and that was enough to put me at 61 with a 4k buffer! Finally I can use Cure V and maybe party with Fhox and the others! One of the parties was led by a Japanese called Firry who led a chain-pulling frenzy of Colibris and Date Erucas. I learned that these worms don’t poison, they roast! Our paladin died once to a massive two-shot that neither I nor our leader (DNC62) could stop, and she died once to a link. The rest of us were able to put down the pair of Erucas and get her patched up.

I was very apologetic to the party for the Paladin’s death because I could have easily stopped it if I had been paying attention to the Eruca’s use of Incinerate. But Firry’s death was someone else’s problem ^^. I did have another issue though – early in I got a blind tell from Rebelion requesting a raise in the area just east of our camp but Firry wouldn’t let me go. And besides me there were only like 3 raise-capables in the area and ALL were in parties. I need to find a way to make it up to him…

This party worked well enough regarding MP and downtime but it’s still clear I need to find a better way to keep MP. Also, I think Firry and I ended on good terms. Early on she kept asking for me in party chat as if she thought I wasn’t doing anything. Hell – buffs, hastes, Barfiras, curing, one Benediction… I was VERY busy! I still hate crawler mobs for their Sticky Thread Slow attack – Haste costs me far too much and I have to cast it a LOT these days…

The other party sucked – that paladin couldn’t hold hate if it came in a bucket. He wouldn’t cure until it was C4 time and by then the mob had been eating away at the other melees. He also wasn’t using his paladin abilities like Sentinel or Defender without having to be asked. Corina, our leader and I chatted about him off and on. I think the rest of us were relieved when it was DB time.

• I PLed Raki for about an hour in the Dunes. The whole thing with his “sister” hasn’t come up again even though “she” has popped on briefly a couple of times since. I still have a feeling that Raki is just yanking my chain but who knows… In any event he and I had a nice time. I also learned that just using Flash for crowd control invalidates that mob for anyone else – 0 xp! Time to update my PL guide again…

• Tried Besieged twice – once for 1450xp and the other was a bust. Even though I was logged in just before the CS with the Besieged icon, and had tried out my new Cure V scroll on many people, I got bupkus… I did see Kaiji and knelt to him.

• Chatted very briefly with Kaloli to see if she wanted PL assistance but she was farming in Gustaberg. By the time she had joined a party I was already tied up.
• Bought more scrolls – I’m now WHM-complete through *70* which if I understand LB4, I can solo easily. I think all I’m missing is Curaga IV and Reraise III. Everything else is sitting in storage ready to go.

• I don’t really like my HP being in Windy. I can’t T-T effectively but at least returning to Aht Urghan is still quick, be it for a party meetup or Besieged. Since I should be able to take WHM all the way to 70 I don’t know if I’ll spend much time on Dancer or Ninja. I should prolly try to split up the time on WHM with the other subs just so I don’t burn out on WHM again. But since breaking 60 I really feel “alive” again as a mage.

Also, with my HP in Windy I’m spending a lot on Mr. Ibwam and his teles. Dammit Monk, I’m the tele-whore around here!

• Now that I’m 61, I really need to buckle down and pick up my AF legs, body and hands. Also, I need to get the Vahzl tele scroll done for the cash. I think just before logging out last night in Jeuno I had seen a mage AF shout but I don’t recall which mage…