Definitely a good day. Some days you get some things accomplished and some days you don't and then some days are like yesterday. Everything lines up perfectly and falls into place in front of you. Nothing can go wrong and nothing does go wrong. I need more days like this, LOL.
There was an evil in Vana'diel. I have actually defeated this evil individually, but I have never faced this evil in its full force. This evil is intimidating and daunting, and some would argue that it is not possible to beat this threat without 18 BLM's >.<.
That evil is the evil within the races of Vana'diel.
That evil is in the apathetic hearts of Mithra.
That evil is in the cowardly hearts of Tarutaru.
That evil is in the envious hearts of Humes.
That evil is in the arrogent hearts of Elvaan.
That evil is in the rageful hearts of Galka.
And they stand together as a force to destroy all of Vana'diel.
If you hadn't guessed by now this post is going to have alot of pictures. ^.^
Versus did the Divine Might fight last night. Now this fight is hard, confusing and complicated. Five different mobs, each with 2 different jobs and each able to use their respective 2 hours. I wont go over the specific strategy for this fight, but lets just say that Taru has to die really fast or everyone is going to die horribly. Ailee even came to do this fight with us, which was really nice, and she even came as RDM which is a very rare sight anymore.
Everyone gathered together at the entrance to prepare. We had too many people for one fight so we were going to have to do it multiple times. 
We had something like to 8 Ark Pentaspheres, because we expected to lose this fight a couple of times before we got it right.
We went in and faced our greatest foes, the evil reflection of ourselves. 
As I have said, the Tarutaru has to die fast before it breakgas everyone and starts warping around. Sadly, I have no pictures of the Taru's unfortunate demise because that punk died so fast everytime we went to fight it that I couldn't even get a screenshot of it. The Mithra was the next that had to die and that was my responsibility. 
The Mithra has HORRIBLE accuracy, it literally would hit once out of about every four swings. Even better, all of my ninjutsu landed. Blind, Slow, Paralyze, it was almost a joke how easy it was to tank the Mithra. Even better than that, it didn't have a multi-hit weaponskill besides Rampage which I believe it used once in the three fights. It tended to charm a random BLM when it two houred. It was funny watching a little Taru running around wacking at a members of the alliance.
After the Mithra went down, its pet was next, on the first run it was the Mandy which is supposed to cause some trouble, but I think the worst it did was bindga everyone one time before the 3 BLM's in the party absolutely destroyed it. The other two times we got the tiger, which was so easy that I dont even know why I took this screenshot of it, LOL 
After the Mithra's pet, it was onto the Galka. It was surprising because the Galka seemed to have a higher defense than even the Elvaan. It didn't do many jumps which was very nice because they have a really strong AOE Stun. In fact, all of the Stuns that the AA's used were really strong, sometime like 5-6 seconds each. But by this time we had all of the melee and BLM's on the Galka and he went down pretty quickly. 
The wyvern was next, and although one time it was killed before the Galka, it never posed any real problem. It was much the same as the ones in the Thickets, it was a chain extender and TP build mob. 
Next came the Hume, who was a real pain in the ass. 
Not that we really had much of a problem with him, but we had to take a Mijin Gakure which although usually not being enough to kill me, it was usually enough to kill the tank at the time. Then it would turn to me and do one of its TP moves, strip my shadows, then do things that are considered sexual offenses in 48 states. But it died just like the rest.
Finally, it was onto the Elvaan. The Elvaan loved to spam Spirits Within, which went through shadows and was almost always a one shot. We pretended for a while that we could straight up tank it but it ended up being kited usually because anyone that stood close enough got one shotted. 
The Elvaan took a while but it went down and we had our victory.
The apathy of the Mithra was overcome. 
The cowardace of the Tarutaru was defeated. 
The envy of the Humes was vanquished. 
The arrogance of the Elvaan was rebuked. 
The rage of the Galka was conquered. 
And we emerged victorious three times out of three tries. 
Here is our best result. 
Yep, we used a standard party set up and beat it in ten minutes. Our longest attempt took 15 minutes, which was actually our third attempt.
After all three runs were done, I headed over to the Shrine to pick up my reward. 
Of course I picked the Suppanomimi. It is the obvious choice for a NIN and also my future WAR. I did have a twinge of guilt for not getting the Bushinomimi for my SAM, which it is probably better for, but then realized that freaking 5% haste on weapon delay in the ear slot makes that other stuff a joke in comparison. 
After the DM fight, Charlet wanted to get some xp and Ailee wanted to burn on her PLD/NIN to test out her new Suppanomimi, so we grabbed Omoi, Gordor and Bgalvin and headed out to fight some Trolls in Mount Zhaylom. The trip to get to the trolls used to be really easy. Out of the Halvung Staging Point, sneak and invis, through the Gates of Halvung, past the Wamoura Princes and on to fight the trolls. That was until the put the full grown Wamoura into the game. So, you now have to sneak past these true sight monsters, and some of us are better at sneaking than others. *coughAileecough* These guys are beast. They will rip you to shreads if you are not ready. Hell, they will rip you to shreads even if you are ready. 
That is the before picture, this is the after picture. Ouchies. 
And now we know who keeps aggroing the Diabolos NPC's in Dynamis-Tavnazia. Yeah, I am going to get punched for that one. LOL (Hi, Ailee ^.^)
We beat up some Trolls for a while until I was able to see this nice little scene. 
I got level 72 on my SAM. Its really nice to progress on my SAM, the faster I can get the 75 the better, as I want to be able to get more end-game useage out of my SAM. Now, the question of the Hagun... I will get to that in a minute.
Before that though, Thazienne requested Omoi and my presence in the Altepa Desert right after our party. I suspected that it was to fight the Tungi mob, but I wasn't sure. Lucky for me I was right! (I was actually not exactly sure that is why we were going. I thought it might also be to help Thaz with the Pendragon Axe mob which he has been trying to get for a while. I wasn't even sure the spawn was for me, LOL, I thought that Kitty had his Tungi already). We headed into the QSC and although Thaz has been having major internet issues as of late we were able to pop Tribunus VII-I. 
This mob is pretty easy and I actually got my best Tachi: Kasha ever (which I thought I screenshoted but couldn't find it when I was uploading the pictures), even though this mob was something like an EP to me and I had 300 TP. It was like 1200+ with my still gimp Kaz. Now Tribunus can be a real pain about dropping the Tungi, but not on a day like yesterday. 
The Tungi was mine. I now have the standard issue axes for my WAR from the early 60's until 71. Now to just get my WAR to a level that I can use the Fransisca and Tungi.
Now, I wanted to say I have great friends. Thaz for searching for and finding the Antican Tag to pop the Tungi NM. That was just an incredible act of kindness especially considering his severe internet issues. I was so happy, and Kitty does this kind of thing for people ALL THE TIME. He may be the greatest, most kind, supportive and generous player I have ever met. He is a great player and a great human being.
In the same breath, I should mention that Glacian is also a great guy! He is letting me borrow his Hagun! That is fantastic! I will be using it until at least I get to 73 when I can use my Ushikirimaru or until I can afford to get a Hagun or at very least I find one on the AH. I am afraid the price is going to go up on them because there hasn't been one on the AH for days now. Anyway, this is how it looked on me. \^.^/ 
And that was my damn good day. I dont know what else could have happened to make it any better. I was pleased to say the least.
Now, I wanted to mention something about game mechanics (like this post wasn't long enough). I have been trying to convience people for a while that you can skill up on a missed swing for a weapon or more importantly you can skill up parrying without a parry proc'ing. Now I have the proof. 
In this shot I get Overthrow missing me and the Troll just plain hitting me, but at no point does a Parry proc. And yes, I have "Attacks you evade" unfiltered (I have to for my NIN) so if it did proc you would see it here. So for those that doubted me, you really can skill up on failed procs. It just doesn't happen very often.
Tomorrow I want to talk about how PLD/NIN fits well into end-game burn parties, and yes I am being serious. Time to break that little elitest shell just a little bit more.
I am also thinking about changing the format for my pictures in the blog. More cropped shots and making them easier to download. Tell me what you think.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
A good day.
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Conversations.
I talk to people. This shouldn't come as much of a shock, but I try to go a bit deeper than the regular "Sup" and "LOLGenbu." I try to actually engage people in the game, about the game. Its very easy to get lost in this game, focus too much on one piece of gear, obsess over its flaws, and lose sight of the great freedom the game provides. For me, this myopic focus is on gear and leveling, but it happens to everyone. We get upset when we can't achieve our goals in the time we want to achieve them. We lament time wasted camping and not getting claim. We rage over the lack of drops, a broken synth, undercutters, etc.
But we love the game, and we love the greater part of the game, the vision that goes far beyond this weeks Kirin or Nidhogg or Jailor of Love. We love the friendships, we love the challenge, we love the action.
Here is a conversation I had with Draconum. I was shocked to learn that he has no jobs at 75. I was pleased when I learned the reason why (oh, and the compliments about the blog are a huge ego booster, so I totally left those in ^.^).
(Just to be clear I did chop this up to get it to fit, it would have been huge and filled with other people's conversation if I hadn't).
It was a great, uplifting conversation. Not everything is the relentless march to the end. The end of what? Where ultimately are we going? Is the game really so much a reflection of real life that we can look at it in much the same way? That we need to enjoy the trip and the people around us, rather than consider only the goals that we have for ourselves? There is no "beating" the game, so why not enjoy every moment.
And just so you dont think that I have gone all philosophical and intellectual on you, I had this nice emote conversation with Ryskar shortly after talking to Draconum. 
And that sums up the entire spectrum of the game quite nicely I believe.
Vespasian and Omoi have been trying to get a Morgenstern for quite some time now. The Morgenstern is the 500 WS points Critical hit club. Apparently, it is the second best high damage club in the game, second only to Mjollner. It drops out of the KS30 Contaminated Collesium which, if you dont know, is a fight against a rather silly Marlboro named Evil Oscar. So we headed up to Horlais Peak to fight Oscar and his bad breath. 
Oscar is funny because he isn't that hard really, but he does have a move called Extremely Bad Breath that is one shot death if you are in range. He takes three breaths before hand so you at least get an alert. 
It takes a little practice, but it is a very doable. 
The last time we went we were unlucky and didn't get any Morgenstern's, this time however we were much more lucky. 
We also got some rather rare Morbolger Vines which will help me get my Brown Belt for whenever I level MNK (probably sooner rather than later).
When it was my turn to go we had a rather easy fight and I got to open the chest. 
only to discover this crap: 
LOL, and yes, I did obsess over my crappy drops. Well, at least Omoi got a Thyrsusstab out of it (the Critical Hit staff).
In the end Vesp and Omoi both ended up with Morgansterns and Hellzfury, Omoikitte and I ended up with Morbolger Vines. Its actually a pretty bad assed looking mace, like the one that Naja Salaheem uses. 
I had a rather interesting lot on my Morbolger Vine, to which I was accused of dabbling in the occult and other such slanderous utterances. I certainly had no idea what they were talking about, then alone why they would level such horrible accusations. I am just an innocent elvaan. 
ANYWAY...
After we had finished up the runs, a couple of us decided that we wanted to go get some merit points. So Kalgar, Hellz and Tamarisk left, and we picked up Ice who just got off of work. I peeked around for the last two members and found Battera, a very nice JP WAR, that once saved a pretty horrible party that I had put together. Battera is the man! Tarutaru King! I hope that everyone has the pleasure of meeting him. He is really upbeat and converstaional compared to most JP players I have met. We also picked up Emir, a Ridill WAR (jealousy woot!) and headed out to the mire to fight some Imps and Flys. 
But before any of that came to pass, we found this poor soul laying face down in the Mire. 
Sorry Gaw, you got screenshotted, and you will now go down in history on the blog. Too bad for Gaw that Amensia blocks two-hours. f(o_o)f
We managed to get three or four pretty long chains, this one being the best that I got to see. 
I died twice, sadly, and once it didn't break the chain so we might have gotten something higher. This was with a party of Nin, War, War, Mnk, Rdm, Whm. More proof that you dont need a bard to be able to get high chains. People spend way too much time hoping for that perfect party instead of actually going out and getting some xp. The lovely thing about the mire are the Jnun and the wonderful e-peen that they provide. 
I was doing pretty good damage all night and my new Swift Belt was pretty nice for the additional haste. I was able to recap xp on Ninja from losing it to Evil Oscar and get another merit and a half.
That was my day, it was pretty fun over all.
I should mention the changes to SMN that SE is making. I dont really think that it will change the fact that alot of people will still see SMN's as a healer, but it will at least provide the SMN's with more to do that just casting Ecliptic Howl or Earthen Ward over and over. Some more damage from SMN would also be nice for xp parties, as long as they can manage their MP.
Monday, October 02, 2006
Catharsis
There was a scene in Clerks called Catharsis, that involved a convience store food fight. Cathartic indeed.
This blog entry is going to be cathartic in much the same way.
RMT.
Actually not even RMT, because as much as I hate the RMT, they wouldn't exist if not for the lazy. The lazy exist at all levels of the game, its not just new players that buy gil to support themselves because "farming is boring." It infects the most "elite" players also. The perfect proof can be found in the answer to this question: How do endgame LS's do so many Kirins and Byakkos yet are never camping in Sky? And the simple answer is that they buy their gems from RMT. Not all of them do this, and a few will camp NM's in sky, but a good deal of the gems come from RMT. If their wasn't a market for it, the RMT wouldn't be camping Sky. People say that changing the gems in Sky to Rare/Ex wouldn't do anything to RMT, but it would for this very same reason.
Everyone has their own happy little plausible deniablity. My friend quit the game, gave me millions. I grow elemental ores. This gem fell in my lap, like mana from heaven. And just like so much else in this game, the actions of the lazy, oh sorry, I mean "elite" players, have consequences for everyone else. This effect is much more profound for those that only do Sky, an action that is now laughed at by those same "elite" players. We are the ones that have to deal with "elite" laziness and greed. We are the ones that have to watch Ulli get hacked over and over.
There are always excuses, there are always denials, there are always return allegations. "Everyone buys gear off the AH from RMT." Its time for a lesson in culpability. This is the difference between not knowing where the item is coming from, and purchasing an item directly from Satan himself. All the excuse, denials, and finger pointing doesn't fix the fact that you just bought an Ulli stone from "Rmtgemsrus" in Batilla Downs.
And sure, its easy for the "elite" players to say they just don't care, because in reality, they don't. Sadly, its a reflection of society as a whole. A lack of responsibility for anything. Oops, I dinged that other car in the parking lot, they won't notice if I just leave. Oops, I fudged a little of our accounts so that I can buy a golden umbrella stand (true story). Oops, we invaded Iraq and made the risk of terrorism far worse than we could ever imagine (this ain't political kiddie's the Bush Administration are the ones that said this). FULL TILT RANT.
STOP BUYING GEMS FROM RMT YOU LAZY FUCKS.
*cough*
Ahhh, catharsis. I am feeling much better now. :)
Now whats next. Ahh, the weekend. Well I had more RL obligations this weekend, so as usual I didn't accomplish everything I wanted. Freaking RL, its the doom of all gamers.
Anyway, Friday night Omoi and I got a pretty bad xp party in Bibiki Bay, but at least I got a little further into 71 (maybe 10k more). But more importantly, I finally removed the latent from my Tachi of Trials. 
Now you might say using a Trial weapon is gimp in an xp party, but sadly it is just as good as my Kazaradichi, except it has a latent of +20 HP, instead of a worthless +2 Chr. The damage and delay are exactly the same.
Saturday morning Omoi, Charlet and I headed to Norg to activate the last part of the Tachi: Kasha quest. Then we headed out to Kuftal Tunnel, where we beat up Kettenkaefer. Charlet spent more time tanking the beetle than I did on my Ninja. I didn't mind much, LOL. Headed back to Norg to finish off the quest and finally received Tachi: Kasha. I should have taken some screenshot of the beetle or getting Kasha, or anything else in that sequence but its was early and I was tired.
We headed back to Whitegate then went out to the Woodlands to test out my new fancy (and flowery) weaponskill.
Here is a supersweat action shot:
And another of me chopping up a poor defenseless bee (Ailee is calling PETA on me right now):
Here is my second Tachi: Kasha ever. It had to be a Double Attack/Crit or something, because it is just ridiculous: 
After this Omoi and I headed out to level NPC's. It was pretty easy going now that I have switched Zenji over to healer type. Before I did that he liked to get himself killed all the time. I actually got him to stay out for the full time for the first time ever LOL. Yeah, I dont call him much but I want to do it more often. It is pretty fun leveling him. Apparently he is level 32 now, but I have never noticed him getting a level. 
Sunday was up and down. Sky sucked. Grabbed Faust on the way down to Ulli, camped Ulli for 5 hours, watched the RMT claim Ulli again. And thus you are left with the rant at the top of this post. *deep breath* I am not going to delve back into it, but I hate RMT and hate some "elite" players.
After sky we had a Swift Belt run planned. Now, I have had my Fomor Codex for months, much in the same way that I had my Airtank just sitting around for a long time. I actually had it in storage, and pop items that I put in storage are usually there for a long time ^.^ We gathered up a big group of Versus people, then headed out to the Sacrarium. We headed out to the Hume Fomor NM, Balor, first: 
We were able to rip through him pretty quick, but he didn't drop his belt for Borin. Sorry Borin. >.<
Next we headed back through the Maze to fight the evil cat NM, Caithleann. Since Iceblazek was the only kitty with us, he got to pop it. Now, I wish I had gotten a screenshot of this too, but likely it would have just been a mess, because once Caithleann two houred it just liked to spam stoneskin and blink. We couldn't do any damage for pretty much the whole of its two hour. Ice was lucky though because his kitty dropped the Swift Belt for him! Next was onto the Taru room. Eji was supposed to go next but he didn't have enough hate built up to pop it yet, so we went onto the Elvaan room.
This was Kalgar's turn to pop the NM, Luaith. Now the Elvaan NM is supposed to be really tough because it Double Attacks and Triple Attacks constantly, but we had four NINs with us so this wasn't really an issue at all. Luaith went down pretty quickly: 
But it did not drop the Swift Belt for Kalgar either. >.<
We then headed back around to Balor to try for Vespasian. Another smooth fight and another drop! Vesp got his Swift Belt, and is currently quite pleased with the amount of haste he can stack on his WHM. This had set up quite an interesting pattern of a drop happening on every other NM. And this meant that Eji was next, but interestingly he did not have enough hate to pop the NM LOL. Not saying that he was lying but it was VERY convienent LOL. So I just said I would go next to get the bad luck out of the way. So we took down Luaith without much of an issue. Not really hoping for much (eh, I am superstitious just like everyone else), but low and behold: 
Here it is equiped on my level 50 capped SAM: 
After my drop we tried one more for Lucella, but we didn't get a drop. It was getting late and Omoi was really tired, so we left and decided that we were going to try again next week.
After that, I decided that I wanted to get some more xp on my Sam. I have been sitting on 71 for about a week now, and I have been trying to level it but haven't been very lucky with parties. So I picked up a BRD, a couple of NINs, a WAR and a WHM. 
Now, I have xped with one of the NINs a couple of times now, Catalystic, and it seems like every time he is in a party for more than an hour, he DC's and doesn't come back. Its happened 3 time so far, so I wasn't surprised when it happened again, but I managed to find a replacement no problem. Our BRD was a little crazy, as he kept pulling these: 
I got about 20k xp in the party, leaving me only about 10k TNL. And the real question of whether I need to get a Hagun is looming larger and larger. I think I am just going to bite the bullet and get it, even though there are other things that I need like getting my D. Head made, and saving for end-game WAR axes.
Oh and finally, it was a mistranslation. >.< Here is SE's official word on how empathy works now:
[Job Trait: Empathy]Oh wow, thanks, what a bonus! You are making it work the way it should have worked to begin with! We are so lucky.
Players who have acquired the Empathy job trait will be able to copy the Stoneskin effect to their wyvern when using the job ability Spirit Link.
Everything else is the same as already announced. Oh beautiful day! What a DRG buff! orz
#1 ~ Monk
#2 ~ Samurai
#3 ~ Ninja
#4 ~ Dragoon
Chaotic Pellucidity
Teabags and KY Jelly
The Bloggaru!
