Finishing and starting.

Saved the world from total destruction, again. No need to thank me, you can just send gil. Izman, Borin, Hellz, Ninjafox, Omoikitte and I completed the Treasures of Aht Urhgan missions last night. We started with the mission that we could not complete last night because we were limited on people. So we went back, and quickly dispatched the evil Imperial Guard, even in its new form. The fight was pretty interesting, but with our set-up it was pretty easy except for the random death that happened on the first pull of the BLU and its spawned gears. After the gears were dealt with the rest of the fight was easy peasy. After, the fight was done we ran around and got our last cutscenes before the final fight. We decided to try out the last fight with the set up we used for the previous mission which was NIN, NIN, WAR, DRG, RDM, WHM, and even with this pretty imperfect set-up we got Alexander to 4% before it used Divine Judgment for the second and wiped us out, and even with that we probably only lost because we rushed because we were running out of time. Anyway, after that we switched to PLD, SAM, RNG, DRG, RDM, WHM. This let us dispatch the BLU at the beginning much more easily with a greater variation of damage, and also let Borin stand back and do damage even after Divine Judgment. Basically, we found it pretty easy to deal with Alexander normally, especially once we just moved Iz back to take the AoE's and not have to worry about physical attacks, he would even run up and switch to a shield for a Shield Bash LOL, the only problem was Divine Judgment and that looks like it only happens two times in the fight, once at about 50% and once at about 5%. We were able to do a good 10% after the first Divine Judgment but with that much damage spread in an already MP draining fight, a first wipe was almost inevitable. We just pulled back, regrouped and at about 8% two-houred Alexander down. Borin with the killshot right as Hellz and I eat it. LOL And I love Borin's and Hellz's comments at the end. That fight is really fun, and I would love to do it again if anyone needs it.

The cutscenes to follow immediately after the fight were amazing, Odin and Alexander in an epic battle. Odin even busted out Gungnir for Alexander. And this shot was just awesome, the dark and light avatar locked in mortal combat. I wish I had gotten a better shot of this scene because Odin and Alexander just had incredible effects all around them and the action moved incredibly fast and was awe-inspiring. Interestingly enough, in that last cutscene you can see the Imperial Guard you have to fight right before Alexander, he reraises three times, and appears to still not be dead. This leads me to a comment about the next update. I think that there will be another update before the expansion. I know that I said before there probably wouldn't be one but if you think about it and the semi-confirmed release date of Dec. 3rd for the expansion and the fact that it is only September. Now, after CoP there was at least one, if not more, updates after the end of the CoP storyline, like the update that introduced the Bahamut fight and the ZM/CoP earrings fight. It just seems to me there is way too much left to conclude that the ToAU storyline is completely done, and that fact that the Imperial Guard is still around and kicking is just one of the loose ends. Another is that you never actually fight against Odin, and the only chance for that is Einherjar. So, I think we are looking at dealing with the Imperial Guard, and some kind of fight with Odin, whether it is to use him as a summons or to get some other reward we will see, but it just doesn't feel like the end is actually here yet.

Anyway, after the fight and the long diatribe, we headed out for our rewards. Let me first say that the fights were not as easy as the earlier fights, and probably on par with the last CoP fights but they were still easier to get around to, and collecting our reward was easier also. So we headed back to Naja, and were summoned to the palace for the coronation of Nashmeira. It was kind of silly to coronate the new queen without a crown, but it was nice to see the return of our little puppet friends. ^.^ And the love that they gave to us. :) After the cutscene we got to pick our ToAU reward ring and of course I got the melee ring. :) The more and more I think about this ring and my set up the more I like it. I will still keep my Sniper's Ring, but I don't really know why, maybe I could use it on MNK later on when I am making a meat build but I think losing one Accuracy is with the gain in 4 Attack, maybe, maybe not. The ring will be great for Salvage and Assault especially if I use my SAM. I also received my flag of Aht Urhgan which looked sweet in my Mog House and went perfectly with my Bastokan flag. Finally I headed back over to Naja Salaheem and got my Glory Crown back! Naja even signed it for me, :/ and informed me of my huge debt burden for her. 980,000 Imperial Gold Pieces, but she doesn't apparently accept trades so I think I am in the clear for now. :) After finally walking out of Salaheem's Sentinels with my new ring, flag and crown in tow, I found myself in Aht Urhgan in the early morning of a bright and sunny day. It felt rewarding and gave the city a whole new feel, I am sure that it will fade, but it almost felt like my first day in Aht Urhgan. Borin, Izman, Hellz, Omoikitte and I grouped up for our final screenshot after finishing up the storyline (Ninjafox was already 2 hours late for bed and couldn't stick around).
In other news, Versus joined forces with LifeandDeathAngels to do a TP burn on Kirin yesterday. The first of the two Kirins went smoothly and was for Versus. We got another D. Body, a Shining Cloth and a Kirin's Pole. The first Kirin used its two hour early and also managed to summon a Suzaku, but the assist alliance absolutely destroyed it. They killed Suzaku so quickly that it didn't even get a chance to two hour. The second one went even more smoothly, and we got Kirin to something like 30% in less than a minute, but unlike the first one it used a stronger Astral Flow, and we didn't keep up the damage a quickly, so it ended up taking 2:44 to kill it. :) LifeandDeathAngels got the same exact drops that we did. LOL We killed Kirin so quickly that it had only just started summoning when it died and was still summoning after it was dead on the ground. TP burning Kirin was fun, sure, but it ended up excluding a bunch of people that normally get into the Kirin fight, and it really didn't take as much skill as the way were normally straight tank Kirin. We will probably do this occassionally with LifeandDeathAngels but I don't see it being a permanent thing. I like the challenge involved with a straight tanked Kirin, and it gets a lot more people involved in the fight. I suppose that the TP burning Kirin is a novel thing to do, but once you do it the only reason to stick with it is to either further service your e-peen or to increase farming efficiency and since I don't really care about my e-peen all that much and the speed at which we get drops from Kirin is already pretty good there doesn't seem to be a need to do it all that often. Maybe if it would help Iz get his W. legs faster... LOL

That was it for yesterday, sorry this was so late, I was away from my desk all day. Hopefully tomorrow will be earlier. :)