Flawless Assaults, Flawed Moblin Maze Mongers

Mondays and Wednesdays assaults went pretty much perfectly this week. Despite having no real tank for Nyzul Isle we went 3/3 with three Nyzul armor drops! Guest stars Gaffy and Shinku were certainly rewarded for their volunteering - Gaffy got both Askar body and Askar legs for his troubles. I'm sure many people would kill for such a good looting of Nyzul that Gaffy got. Shinku also got the Denali footwear. He wasn't singing the item's praises on chat but I'm sure he's glad to have those boots.

Wednesdays assaults also went just as well, with another 3/3 week. Everyone in the group now has all the assualts complete up to First Lieutenant. We'll be taking a bit of a break from Wednesday assaults for a while in preparation to tackle the dread First Lieutenant boss fights. I hope to join some random assaults in the meantime in order to keep my assault points total up so I can afford Salvage.

Moblin Maze Mongers apparently works now. I can't wait to try it out once I get some free time... Thursday to Sunday for me is most peoples' Monday to Friday in terms of work time.

I was pumped for my first Limbus yesterday, but like everything else in life I waited till the last minute to log in and the update download made me late for the event. Instead of begging for people to wait I decided to try Moblin Maze Mongers instead.

But wait... it was broken at the time. Disgusted with myself, I did lots of Campaign to relieve my frustration. I got a Copper Emblem of service out of it though. I've been slacking in Campaign and am far from the highest Campaign rank but I have lots of time to catch up. I'm sure that whatever the Wings of the Goddess "end game" content ends up being will require at least the highest rank medal. I'm also thinking that you'll need to complete all the available campaign ops at least once, so I want to get started on that. Currently I need to collect 4 roast mushrooms for an op. Funny stuff. It's an excuse to buy a stack though, hehe.

Nyumomo Doll Blues, Lancaster Highs

Another version update has arrived and with it, the excitement of new quests and missions. I always like to do these right away because you can't "look it up" yet and you get to keep that thrill of discovery (which is what adventuring is all about). Unfortunately I've hit a brick wall in the form of having to get an Ex doll to drop from only 2 mob types in the game. Of course, by the time I got to Batillia Downs the mobs in question (which previous were probably virtually never fought) were being camped all to hell. My FFXI playtime in the forseeable future will involve wondering around Batillia Downs hoping for a rare drop. /sigh

On a brighter note, Blue's salvage efforts have resulted in Lancaster scoring some Marduk pants. Similar to Val's boots, the Marduk Shalwar is the undisputed best pants on the game for Bard. It makes me really happy to see Blue members get things like this; more happy then they probably know. I can't wait to see what this non-descript linkshell is able to accomplish in the future...

Perhaps more than any of us thought possible.

Moon Charioteer and Runic Key

So far it's been a great week in FFXI for me. This past Sunday we finally completed a Salvage area by defeating the Long-Armed Chariot. It was a long and grueling battle that had some iffy moments. The repeated Brainjacks serve to make the fight even longer than it needs to be. I died toward the end by casting Curaga II in a situation where hate was bouncing all over the place. I certainly deserved to die there and everyone else agreed by not saying anything.

Blue got the title of Moon Charioteer and Valenia somehow managed to get all three pieces of that MNK/NIN/PUP whatever footwear. After looking it up, this seems to be the best footwear in the game for MNK. Grats Val, you deserve it for putting all this stuff together.

I'm also so proud of the LS in general for completing one of the toughest events in FFXI. I'm so happy that I can do these events and complete them without selling my soul to an HNMLS. You guys are awesome, I hope you know that.

The next day the Nyzul Isle group skyrocketed from Floor 86 to 100, going 3/3 and defeating a totally overwhelmed Kaihmera to earn a runic disc for the 5 members who've been there from the beginning. We've been hammering away at this assault for a looong time. There have been many disappointments along the way. In the end we finally got there though. Next up is lots of Nyzul hat farming! Congratulations to Terre, Evele, Zaanea and Valenia.

And thanks to them for sticking with it for so long.

Four is Plenty

Apparently people read this, so I'll make an effort to make more of these.

Today was Nocturnal assault Wednesday; Chief Sergeant edition. Tamyaa was a no-show... which kinda sucks because there's going to be some repeat assaults next week just to get Tamyaa through them. Sometimes I feel like I'm dragging this group kicking and screaming through the assault missions. /sigh

First up was Operation: Snake Eyes. We failed horribly at this last week (which I would've blogged the hell out of if I wasn't lazy) and we had even less members this week but somehow we got the job done. The DD's ooh'd and aaaah'd at their damage numbers versus the Qutrub at the beginning. I was too busy to do a /rolls his eyes emote.

The stupid belly-dancing Lamia was finally taken out. I was right about it trying to bring a charmed group to the charmed second general; in a scary moment the Lamia seemed to be bringing us there at Flee speed. Fortunately charm wore off just in time. Terre figured out that you could stun Belly Dance, then get everyone to turn around the potential-Belly Dance TP move the Lamia will use after stun wears. Smart thinking, Terre!

The final Lamia was a BLM. This fact wasn't hammered in until I got Sleepga'd. Shinku did some fancy footwork kiting the charmed general and something about Shadowstitch. It was a close call at the end (as all these types of fights seem to be) but we managed to clear this one with just four people! That, and a first time clear bonus meant a hefty assault point reward for everyone.

Second was Imperial Code. This one was straight-forward; kill the NMs, avoid everything else. Terre learned the hard way that although the Kusa have true-sight aggro, they also have true hearing at small range. He tried to squeeze between 2 of them and they both turned around at once. Funny stuff.

Last was Deserter, where you have to break the Lamias' weapons, not kill them. Nobody told Shinku, Krysten and Terre this though. They slaughtered almost every Lamia they encountered. We got a paltry assault point reward for it but Terre got the clear which is what matters.

Next week will be the final three Chief Sergeant assaults that the group needs. Hopefully everyone shows up! *cough* They say that half of everything is showing up but after my experiences with Nocturnal Wednesdays I'd say it's more like 80%.

In the future, I'll blog about Nyzul on Mondays, Nocturnal Assaults on Wednesdays and actual WHM stuff any other day.

...odd... I just got the sensation that a monkey has gotten off my back. hmm

Corporal Assaults, Completed!

Assault Wednesday! woo!

First up was Lebros Supplies. This one is notorious for its difficulty and rightfully so. You basically need 6 party members to complete. Thankfully Reinika offered to help us out (thanks Reini!). Shinku took the task of keeping track of food and fed soldiers (poor guy) and did a hell of a job keeping everything straight. I write stuff up before hand in the hopes of keeping everything straight but I freeze up at the time of the assault. Krysten was kind of... new to the experience and I was worried that some miscommunication between her and the rest of the group would've cost us the run. He figured stuff up soon enough though. We completed it in 21 minutes which is some sort of record. All party members have it done now, so never again! ( no Storm Cape for our group, I guess)

Second was Building Bridges. This was quite similar to Evade and Escape but instead of being horribly raped by a Dahak when you are spotted, you are just sent to the start. This is counterbalanced by having many more Lamia patrolling the hallways. Luckily there are pillars in many of the rooms so that you can avoid being sighted or pull the old end-around when you're being chased. I got caught once but managed to hit the South switch so I feel I pulled my weight in that one.

Lastly was lol-Counting Sheep. I was surprised it made the list but it was incomplete by the most party members, so whatever. The ore-food-gambling system is something that couldn't be explained in LS chat without confusing the hell out of people. So the Corporals in our group went in blind (much like I did a while ago) and stumbled their way through. We managed to get 3 of the 5 sheep which isn't bad considering the amount of new members. I went 0/3 on that stupid gambling game, cause the Qiqirn cheats. I still managed to rescue 1 sheep though.

So yeah, we did quite well this week. I'm glad Reinika joined us; she's a Captain so she's done it all. Next week: Sargeant assaults!

Nyzul Isle; Then and Now

Wow, I haven't updated this forever. Well, from now on I'll make one of these after every endgame session.

In trying to avoid the HNMLS scene like the plague I've managed to find my own personal "endgame". Basically it's the two events I run every week; Nyzul Isle and regular Assaults. I wanna talk about Nyzul Isle.

Nyzul Isle has been going on forever. I'm eternally grateful that Zaanea, Evele, Terre and Valenia have stuck with it for so long. At the beginning there were many failures and disappointments. During that whole time I was dreading any of these members saying "I've had enough of this." I must admit that there were times where we would get kicked out of the zone after a truly desasterous run and I'd be thinking similar things. There's was always that silence right after the event ends that would last way too long. Penny for their thoughts? I'd rather not know...

Yet they stuck with it and know everyone is reaping the benefits. Personally I'm 4/5 on the Goliard set. Some of the pieces are statistically not very good but I find an excuse to wear them whenever possible (mainly because of what they represent). Many other pieces have been gotten by the rest of the group as well.

While the focus recently has been hammering Floors 20, 40, 60 and 80 in the hopes of getting a Nyzul Isle armor, I hope to someday switch the focus to getting the party the runic key item. 3 of our members have reached the Captain rank somehow so with a runic key and a Nyzul Isle weapon they can in theory start the long road to a Mythic weapon. Helping someone on the way to a Mythic weapon would make me smile inside.

Good luck tonight, guys.

Campaign Sunday

Sunday was Campaign Battle day. The current Campaign system is broken in some way, because the beastmen have prett much the whole map in their grasp. I spent the evening trying to get cutscenes from NPCs in Bastok Markets (S) but kept getting interupted by the Quadav actually attacking the city.

It didn't matter anyway, because I didn't realize I was heading toward a Burning Circle fight that was pretty much impossible to solo. Val offered to help, as did Yev, but she didn't have the cutscenes to enter the fight. Getting them was difficult as the beastmen were attacking every 5 minutes. In the end it was too late at night to do the fight. Maybe next time.

This Wednesday is the first meeting of the Assault group I've tried to put together. Hopefully it all goes smoothly; I did research on the Assault missions and what not. I need to get in touch with Mateuns though, as I don't know any of his assault info.

Also today I may finally get to shelf Scholar at level 37 and sub it on my White Mage without feeling guilty about it, which is kind of exciting. I was experimenting with /SCH during Sunday's Campaign. I'm still learning the ins and outs of Sublimation. And Celerity is negated if I can't cast the spell fast enough afterword to warrant halving the casting time. It really is a whole new way of playing WHM, and I can see the benefits of the sub already. Once I get used to the new job ablilities I can see myself subbing it full time.

Maxed Merits, Assault forming

Today was quite productive. I decided to merit it up in prepartion for the new version update. There's some WHM upgrades on the way, and I wanted to be as prepared as possible. Well, my limit points are currently maxed out at 10.9999. You can't be more prepared than that.

The Assault group also seems to be coming together. Wednesdays at 10pm EST. I'd like to rush a run in this week, but that might be a little rude.

SCH, SAM, and Assault plans

Leveling SCH to 37 is proving more difficult than I imagined. Again, I could not find a party to level with and had to duo with my NPC again. Fortunately I was expecting this and got a tactics pearl for just such an occasion. However the exp was still horrible. I'm still a level 32 Scholar.

Yesterday was what might have been the last "Cult of Val" perma meeting, and I dinged Samurai to level 75 at long last. Most of the party was on Teamspeak (as well as a few other LS members) and it was quite entertaining to finally talk to these people with voice after all these years. I hope the Teamspeak trend will continue and grow so that I can chat with the whole LS on it. Good times.

I'm still working on getting a regular assault group going because Salvage is fast approaching and I simply do not have the Assault points to participate at the moment. Crazze and Tamyaa have expressed interest, but although they are awesome players, I doubt that every single Assault mission can be trio'd. We may simply have to make due, though. The goal of this group may be to simply get Assault points by spamming Assaults that we have mastered. My hope is that we try to do all the different Assaults, as that's the fastest way to move up the Mercenary ranks.

Huge update

Long time no post! I let this thing rot for a bit, but I received a bit of guilt for not updating, so here goes.

Scholar, scholar, scholar. Apparently it is now THE sub for White Mage, so I've been working really hard toward getting the job to level 37. Currently it is at 32.

I've started to have real trouble finding a party at this point, which is quite discouraging. I resorted to duoing with my NPC in Batillia Downs after searching for a party for a little too long. EXP was horrible of course, but it's better than nothing. I also don't have my NPC in the gearset I'd like her to be in yet, so doing this changed some of her gear.

Nyzul Isle is still going strong. I still can't get over the stingyness of the drops of the HNMs in there, but recently we got Evele some Askar dirs. yay!

With the release of the new relic weapons on the horizon, I'd really like to try to get to floor 100 soon. Unfortunately, that doesn't look like it's going to happen. The Askar body piece is what most of the group is drooling over, and that's floor 80. I'd just like someone to get a Nyzul Isle weapon, it doesn't have to be me. I'd be first in line in helping that person do whatever needs to be done to get the final weapon.

Sunday's perma is... still existing? The group members talk about switching jobs around and whatever which confuses me to no end. All I know is that I'll show up in SAM gear for as long as the perma lasts, and then most likely shelf the job. I'll keep the gear in case the LS needs me as a SAM for things, but I still have much more to do with WHM before I think about improving SAM much.

There's new merit updates arriving with the June update. The merits I've been saving for MND #3 will most likely be spent on two more Shellra V merits, and 2 more Devotion merits. At least these merit decisions are pretty much no-brainers. After that, I still need to make gear improvements to MaxMP, MND, and RestingMP.... and melee/WS. So pretty much everything. I can't wait to finish Scholar so that I can focus on WHM again (and learn what the /SCH fuss is about)

So... that's about it. I'll try to make one of these after each session of play until it becomes habit. I'm usually pretty quiet in-game, so this will also be a good space to just say random stuff that goes through my head but doesn't feel worthy to type in FFXI.

Still haven't finished merits?!

Sorry I haven't blogged for a while, just no motivation I guess.

Monday's Nyzul Isle run was largely succesful. We beat a Cerberus at level 60 and earn access to level 61. Evele also won some Askar mitts, so grats to her.

Wednesday was like other Wednesdays, with me logging in without a clue on what to do. I have no room for gear for a third job, so leveling anything new was out. And I actually didn't want to level WHM when I started, which kind of bothered me. Maybe the job has me burnt out? But I decided to merit anyway. At the end of the night I decided to spend my 10 merit points on the first two MND upgrades. This category is the most intimidating, but I've been putting it off long enough.

Finishing off MND will give me something to do with WHM for a while. I want to max out WHM merits, but I have been slacking lately. Tonights session has motivated me to finish the merits.

Then I'll just have to worry about gear...

Nyzul Isle again, and WHM reloaded

erm... I forgot to get into my own account for a bit. I don't understand how people can do these things on a regular basis without losing their mind. I'll try.

Anyways, the first Nyzul Isle of 08 was difficult to start up, but in the end it was really worth it. Three members were not able to log in, and a 4th didn't seem to have much interested in trying, but I managed to get a group together and damn it, we went anyway!

We beat Floors 31-36, and also got to Floor 40. Mr. Behemoth dropped Kecks, and Val won with a crappy lot. It was nice to see my efforts were not in vain; it gave me a sorta warm feeling inside. =)

As for WHM? I haven't gotten much EXP for it past the Nyzul Isle event. I'm sitting on 4 merit points at the moment. I have no clue what to spend it on, and I probably won't think about it until I max out limit points and have to make a decision.

Gearwise, I'm looking at a couple of different gears, but they all cost lots of gil, and I'm reluctant to spend the 1.2 mil I have.

I briefly thought of picking up BST ( I even wrote out the gearset I'd get) but I don't want to commit to another job until I completely max out WHM. Once merits are done, it'll just be gear. Which means farming, I guess. If it's an HNM drop, I'll pass.

WHM for life