In the last update, SE added both Alexander and Odin as new summons. This is pretty common knowledge I suspect, but what is lesser known is that like all of the rest of the quests to obtain summons, there are other rewards besides the summoning pacts. The quests to prep these fights are longer than the tuning fork quests for all of the rest of the summons, but they are not that difficult to complete. Today, I am going to focus on the Odin quest and the gear rewards from the fight that might be enticing for everyone, not just Summoners.
To start the quest to fight Odin you will first need to go to the Walahra Temple in Whitegate. If you have completed the Aht Urhgan storyline, then a cutscene will immediately be triggered and you will be able to begin the quest The Rider Cometh. While you are in Aht Urhgan you might as well take a moment to pick up a Sutlac and a Irmik Helvasi at the tea house NPC, trust me on this one, it will probably save you some money and time as you will need them later.
Next, you are going to head to Nashmau, head all the way North and talk to Yoyoroon. You will get another cutscene and you will be sent out to kill Ephramadian Shades (Fomor type mobs) to get a Timeworn Talisman. Interestingly and I believe quite rightly, Yoyoroon will not talk to you if you on Blue Mage. I believe this is not because of the general Qiqirn distaste for Blue Mages, but because Yoyoroon has a well developed understanding of FFXI end-game and also recognizes the complete uselessness of Blue Mage. LOL *cough* Where was I? Ah yes, I was able to solo the higher level ones in Caedarva Mire relatively easily on SAM/DNC, but I can't vouch for other jobs. Just be careful to pull them someplace safe because everything in that area aggro low HP, and there are true-sight Imps in the area too. Kill two or three of the Shades and even without TH you should get your Talisman in due time.
Head back to Nashmau and trade the Timeworm Talisman, the Sutlac and the Irmik Helvasi to Yoyoroon. The Sutlac is necessary to get Yoyoroon to accept the Timeworn Talisman and the Irmik Helvasi increases the chance that Yoyoroon will accept the Timeworn Talisman. There is always a chance that Yoyoroon will find that your Talisman will be what Yoyoroon is looking for, and you will have to get another Talisman, Sutlac and Irmik Helvasi. Once, Yoyoroon does take your Talisman, you will need to zone, and then come back and talk to the little Qiqirn one more time and he will give you the Talisman of the Rebel Gods which is a key item. Head back to Walahra Temple, and you will get the Talisman Key (another key item) and you will basically be ready to do the Odin fight after a cutscene at the door in Hazhalm Testing Grounds.
I haven't done the fight yet, but as soon as I do I will report back on it. It doesn't appear to be too difficult though and I have haven't heard any bad reports about the fight so far. Once you take down Odin you can take the gil (definitely not worth it), take the summoning pact (not so great if you don't care about your SMN), or you can pick between some pretty decent gear. Tomorrow I will go over the drops, which one is the best, which is the worst, and how many times you are going to need to do this fight to get everything you want.
Wednesday, May 05, 2010
Cheap Loots: The Rider Cometh
Monday, July 20, 2009
POL News: What You See Is What You Get.
The Update Notes are out and there really isn't anything more than what they have told us about already.
The Union System is in there, but there are still no details on what it entails and what it means. It looks like you just join an alliance, then join the Union and then lot on the rewards when things drop. This does look like it could be abused a lot though. Will people try to Ninja lot things? Is this supposed to be something you only do with people you trust? Do the items drop from Campaign mobs? Are people to pull and hide mobs all the time? I am guessing they considered all of these factors, and we still have no idea what it is going to look like. Here's hoping it's good, but honestly it sounds convoluted and rife for abuse. 
New missions, new quests, new synths, new BLU spells. We don't have any specifics about these except for the fact that the new BLU spells will probably come from the two new mobs that they have added to the new past Northlands areas.
Personally, I think the new "evil Walrus" looks way better than the Gargoyle, but that's just me. The new MMM stuff is in there, and so is the FoV stuff, but there is no mention of these new synths for weapons that you trade with the Fairies. I wouldn't be surprised if that got cut from the update, which I believe will be the first time they had a major announcement about something then cut it from my recollection. The Circle abilities look decent, but if they are still on a 10 minute recast with a 30 second duration then they are still just about as useless as they were before just with better buffs. They even mentioned that the main problem was the duration, but mention notion about changing the duration in the update notes.
The new Ninja JA's are in there, but we already knew everything about it. I think this is probably the only solid known improvement in the entire update. 
They will definitely be useful for NIN, but the shared timer on a 5 minute recast can make it even more difficult for NIN that need to switch between DD and tanking quickly. There is also no mentioned of the diminishing effect over time, so hopefully they got rid of that part of it. Also, the Mijin Gakure change is nice, but like so many things that SE does, it should have happened from the beginning if not a long time ago.
Dragoon got a tiny buff to Empathy in that they can now wake up their Wyvern with Spirit Link. Again, should have happened a long time ago. There was mention that the effect of the rage timers for some HNM was changed but in standard SE fashion, they don't tell us how at all.
Finally, they mention that there are some new furnishing from Campaign and the Campaign bodies are now available. A new item called the Pendant Compass was introduced that will give you your coordinates, [i]when you wear it[/i] and it will be used for some event that has nothing to do with the game, like many of the things that SE has been adding lately.
Ok, I am done. This update has nothing new, no surprises, no avatars, nothing interesting. Just like the last update, it just feels like that slapped some things together, tossed in a new JA and called it an update. I, for one, am not pleased at all.
Click here for a full list of the update notes.
Thursday, July 09, 2009
POL News: Circles and Spells.
New Job update thing on POL. I don't know what else to call it really, I supposed there are job ability adjustments here but there is really nothing "new" except for two new BLU spells. I certainly hope this is not the last installment of job adjustment for this update because this is really next to nothing. I am hopeful, but there is nothing in this update note to indicate that there might be more on the way.
The first thing that was mentioned was the fact that skill ups for low and middle levels has been improved. This was because Level Sync parties and Campaign was limiting the opportunities that players had to get skill ups appropriate for their levels. Now, there could be an issue with this. If it is only for low or middle levels of the job then this is next to useless, because you will still be leveling under Level Sync or Campaign. I assume that they mean low and middle levels of the skills, so if your skills really lag behind you will get more skill ups, but once you get to the cap and you are not understand Level Sync as much because you are doing normal XP or Merit parties, then the skill ups will normalize. This is just another one of those cases where SE is pretty unclear and they will never clear things up, we will just have to find out for ourselves. And I will have to wonder when I will finally get that last level of Parry skill up on SAM or NIN. :(
Circle JA's are getting a boost too. We have no idea what kind of boost they are getting though. SE again is very vague here. Just stating that they know that the Circle JA's are pretty useless compared to their delay, and that they are going to get a big buff. This is going to effect PLD, SAM, DRG, DRG and BST's merit circle ability. Like with many changes, I have to wonder how much SE worries about game balance between the jobs. Instead of looking at the jobs themselves, they are looking at the ability types to get people to use them more often. But does PLD really need another buff? Does SAM? DRG? DRK? BST does definitely, but they are just buffing a merit ability, and not something that effects all BST and more importantly BST that have already handed over their merits for other abilities that might have to now switch them if this JA is really good.
Finally, BLU gets some more spells. This is nice for BLU I suppose, but with very many things in this game these spells will either be awesome and used all the time or they will suck and will never be used. This is especially true of BLU that usually has a limited store of spells they can use and it is already full. I understand that when they put new mobs into the game they will want to add new spells, but a lot of the spells overlap because the TP moves of the mobs overlap. This is fine for the mobs because they still have unique combination of TP moves decided by the developers. But most players are going to just pick the strongest spells, and SE wants people to use new spells they are going to have to provide something strong and unique that BLU's don't already get. Again, I have to wonder if they are just creating to be creative or if they are considering game balance and player choice in any of their development decisions.
Here is the full text of the update notes:
As a follow up to last week's article on new ninja job abilities, it is with pleasure that we introduce other job-related additions and adjustments scheduled for the fast-approaching July version update.
Rate of Gain for Combat and Magic Skills
The introduction of in-game systems such as Level Sync and Fields of Valor, while expediting job level increases in the low and middle level ranges, has caused gains made in combat and magic skills to lag behind.
To address this issue, the rate at which combat and magic skills increase during low and middle job levels is set to be given a boost.
Circle-type Abilities
Up until now, the benefits granted by Circle-type abilities have been lackluster relative to their ability delay. The July version update will see these abilities imbued with additional effects for greatly enhanced usability.
The following abilities will benefit from the above adjustment:
Holy Circle / Arcane Circle / Warding Circle / Ancient Circle / Killer Instinct
Blue Magic
Two new blue magic spells are scheduled to be added in the coming version update.
#1 ~ Monk
#2 ~ Samurai
#3 ~ Ninja
#4 ~ Dragoon
Chaotic Pellucidity
Teabags and KY Jelly
The Bloggaru!
