Bad Etiquette (ROFLWAR and LOLDRG)

Thanks to some good fortune, some ok-ish parties and nice soloing opportunities, DRG has gone from 18~27 in a couple of days with less than five deaths, and not one de-level! (one being narrowly avoided by about 100exp) Having obtained Healing Breath II at level 20 (restoring 75~95 HP, depending on wyvern's TP), soloing became much easier, allowing for relatively easy chains on Even Match~Tough mobs (presumably thanks to the signet bonus, EM things are a pushover).

Buburimu!

As was the case with BLU, birds at the Buburimu outpost proved to be a winner for exp at 19~21 (18-19 was spent in Shakhrami, but the majority of worms there pop up as Decent Challenge at 19, so for future reference it's probably best to do worms at 16~18, then Birds at 19~21).


Qufim!

RMT are back in Qufim, I saw them still there earlier today and was surprised that I'd managed to actually out-level them...a sign that I'm playing too much perhaps?

In any case, I got a party there for a couple of levels and had the usual 'fighting over worms at the pond during the day / oh shit, it's night - every man for himself!' Qufim experience, which of course is a pain but there's little else that can be done about it (and I couldn't find a decent solo spot, and didn't fancy Gigas pets again).

I came back in a couple of levels to solo the worms, which turned out great, getting about 5k exp within 30 minutes although I did encounter another person there (fighting worms) who I wasn't sure if he had arrived before I had. Since he was /anon and had no search comment up, I decided fuck 'em and killed everything in a flash of awesomeness. He left without saying anything, and I ended up feeling bad about forcing him out :(
But really you're asking to be ousted if you don't but a search comment up since it's essentially your fault for allowing that person travel there expecting to see a free camp.

Yuhtunga Jungle! (and the ROFLWAR)


I met a geniune nublet in his prime - the tell-tale signs of the underleveled sub, greatsword on warrior attested to his overall inattentiveness and lack of contribution to the party. I did send him a friendly tell to provoke stuff and keep defender up (he did tank admirably for all of one fight - I suspect he felt he had satisfied me, and went back to whatever he was(n't) doing before. I can at least be thankful that he had a decent full set of armour (a rarity, even at this level) sadly that was all he had, as I was forced to /check him after he switched to polearm to see what the fuck he thought he was doing. His bazaar comment has to be one of my favourites to date.


Hey is that a polear-mhnGHHFGFHHouch

I was lucky enough to have made an excuse to leave before even joining the party (I got the invite when I only had an hour left, anyway) and went shortly after I leveled - by coincidence, I assure you. By that point, the Kazham entrance area was too highly contested and any longer there would have been a waste of time in any case. I used Spirit surge to end on a good note.


I friggen love that 2-hour. I'm not sure why the second jump did so much damage, I know it has a defence down additional effect while Spirit surge is active, but I don't think it's that drastic and I didn't think it would apply to the jump itself. Maybe a critical hit? I don't know.

< call >

It wouldn't be a genuine dunes party if someone didn't have a macro with call1 in it.


This was only exacerbated by the fact he would miss every first shot he took, so we were treated to two, maybe even three instances of ear-splitting agony each and every pull. Of course any attempts to ask him to change/remove it were ignored. Exp sucked too, next time I'll just carry on soloing (Buburimu outpost was turning out to be a very nice spot at 16, would probably have ditched my NPC at 17 and soloed). DRG is 18 now, I'm going to try worms in the Maze of Shakhrami and then maybe start flagging up.


A message from Square-Enix: "Hey guys, we reduced the number of monsters in Promyvion areas to make it easier reaching the boss! We just shoved them all right next the the ??? for the Adventuring Fellow quest since nobody uses them anymore, lol!"


My hopes for a MGS-style stealth 'em up raid of Promyvion went up in smoke, and I had to punch my way through (having not bothered bringing any equipment) it's a good thing my fellow is made of awesome. I also discovered that he can recieve the effect of party area-effect buffs such as Protectra (I didn't check if party-only buffs like Regen could be cast on him as well, but probably not) I think this was ninja'd in by SE a few updates ago when they mentioned "Adventuring Fellow adjustments".


Speaking of SE, they're plotting a new event that looks particularily uninteresting, it seems like some horrible Pankration/Chocobo racing crossover (Gotta....race 'em all?) with a white chocobo thrown in to maybe fuel some vague hope that players might be able to catch/ride it.

Not dead.

Finally got my connection sorted so I can play on my PC at home again. Huzzah.

I managed to find my moogle stats for 2007 on an old PC in my absence, so I slapped them next to this years lot for exciting comparitive adventures:


It appears that KOs have increased drastically in the previous year in relation to anything else (possibly down to leveling/de-leveling a good number of subs to 37). Pretty low increase in kills since last year, but about 20k of those kills are probably bees in Sarutabaruta/Giddeus that I farmed almost exclusively from level 20~75. Pretty much everything else there makes sense, since 2007's lot was a few months after I got 75 and hadn't done much endgame at that point (hence why very few alliances).

Something else from last year I found that made me smile:



I decided to do a couple of Campaign ops, as Cuddles had been sitting on a mountain of tags over the past couple of weeks, and finally got to meet his hero and inspiration for choosing Monk:


Although Zazarg clearly isn't a Monk considering he's always in heavy armour, I still love him ;0.


Campaign sucks.



I managed to get MPK'd about 3 times in the same battle. I find it hard to understand how people feel that kiting dark elementals and NMs past a weakened level 59 monk who's in the middle of resting at 10% HP is going to result in anything productive. Or maybe they just hate me. Bastards.

Enhancing swords. They look nice, have nice stats and are incredibly expensive despite the fact the only job that can use them is mediocre at best for meleeing, not to mention that it really isn't viable in an optimal RDM melee set.



All things considered, I can't really complain about Benny there as he performed pretty well in Campaign, did some debuffing and helped cure and whatnot, so I won't complain. But I die a little inside when I see anyone in full RDM AF, it doesn't even look good outside of the Tabard and Chapeau. D:
Incidentally, the good looking pieces are the most useful ones.

Also, I can't fathom a single reason why any RDM would own an enlightened chain.

Two out of Three.

Paralyze II is now 2/3 (and falling, when I get more merits) to make way for Phalanx II. The latter being much more helpful for Salvage (particularily first floors, I'm hoping it might speed things up a little, although MP never really was an issue before). Naturally, during a Silver Seas run Paralyze actually starts paralyzing things that I cast it on, making me instantly regret deciding to get rid of it. After having watched Powderkeg Yanadahn be rendered immobile for a good few seconds by my spell, I complain and announce that I'm retiring RDM because Paralyze II apparantly operates in an absurd counter-logical fashion.
However it seems Yana, being a fellow RDM, felt pity for me and gave me some trousers to help make me feel better :D.


This puts me on 2/3 for Morrigan's Slops, which is all well and good, but we can't beat chariot bosses yet so it'll still be a while before I see them completed.

More Paralyze madness on some Gears NM;


It especially irritated me that this would happen when I was short of a back/waist cell as well. The gears weren't quite as sympathetic to my whinings so didn't bother dropping the legs we wanted from them. Due to the random nature of paralyze, I'll just write it off as bad luck, and Paralyze I would have performed just as adequately had I used that instead.


In other news, another Adventurer Appreciation campaign is on, which basically involves moogles being stationed around to give you some moderately interesting statistics about your character to compare with others. Also new Anniversary rings for all, which nobody can complain about.

Obligatory 'this is what the moogle says to me' picture:




This is what an anniversary ring does:


I'll be using mine on either getting DRG to a respectable level, or speed through it in Merit parties to cap Phalanx II merits ASAP. Also, the hour recast on it allows for Anniversary ring > Emperor Band > Anniversary ring goodness in merit parties.

Cuddles has got his second ring too, so MNK will take a healthy boost in EXP should I ever get a party on it. The Astral Candescence was recently stolen by the Undead Swarm, so few are going to be partying until the mystery superJP weekender team rescue it for us lazy westerners.

Wise gear.

Is well cool.
Typically, it's the 'lolRDM' set, that people who are unforgivably gimp/confused use full time but it does have some actual use for RDM, albeit its effect being difficult to justify over the loss of inventory space. The reason I just invested in some is for Chainspell stunning. Although the Chasuble is arguably no better than an Errant houppelande (+5 m.acc vs +10 INT respectively), I really just bought it for the looks, I'll probably be selling it on soon. The legs again, vs. Mahatma slops the use is debateable (2 m.acc vs. 8 INT) although there are claims that INT has no effect on dark magic (such as Drain and Aspir) so I may lean towards m.acc on those, plus I have very little magic accuracy gear, so it can't hurt to have some instead of piling on yet more INT. The wise cap (+5 m.acc) certainly does surpass anything else I have for chainspell stunning, however I'll still stick to my Chapeau when using stun/drain/aspir without chainspell to cut down on the recast timers.


Why the sudden intrest in chainspell-stun gear?


Dreamlands dynamis - Buburimu/Valkurm/Qufim usually involve us gathering RDM/DRKs to chainspell stun the bosses, since they have some particularily unpleasant moves (see ~1k damage AoE ranged attack, pictured).

Our recent Qufim run was a success, (despite some instances of unnecessary aggro) - the boss was brought down, and we got a good number of Relic accessories/-1 gear:


Not pictured: Some broken bard shoes dropped towards the end, but I was too busy being harrassed by bats to get a shot of it. We were very lucky to begin with, the ??? point to unlock subjobs was found very swiftly, and they were unlocked before everyone had even entered the area.

I'm 2/3 on clears for Dynamis-Tavnizia access, just need the Buburimu clear now. Considering Tavnazia is a fairly small zone, and only 18 people can enter (oh my..) I do not see it ending well. Not at all.


I like dreamlands Dynamis much more than the regular stuff, primarily because it isn't so soul-crushingly long - although I've only done cities, and I hear that icelands is at least a little more interesting.

I got Cuddles his sprinter's shoes, but I just remembered I didn't get the Gustaberg Maw, so I must remember to do that before I warp him anywhere (else it's a long run through Pashhow > Grauberg > Gustaberg again ._.). Salvage still sucks.

Transportation.

Getting from place to place in FFXI has been made significantly easier over time with the introduction of Outpost warps, Runic Portals in Treasures of Aht Urhgan, and the specific area warps offered in Wings of the Goddess (not to mention Cavernous Maws in most areas, and Recall-wherever).
However, none of this is any use to a new player, and in a way, you have to 'earn' the ability to use most of these fast travel methods in the first place, typically by visiting the place or doing a small quest beforehand. But just starting out, the only way to get anywhere is walking. No chocobos until level 20, no airships until rank 5, etc, etc. Although it's a great feeling when you finally get to use these services, they end up becoming mostly redundant (I for one, use outpost warps to get nearly everywhere since they're much faster that getting a chocobo). Although the annoying part about outpost warps is that your nation has to have control of the desired region before you can do the supply quest to allow you to warp there, making it very difficult to obtain all of the possible warps, especially in regions just outside of rival cities (I'm just short of the Gustaberg outpost, and I'm not getting that any time soon - incidentally, Bastok is the only main city that I have no fast way of accessing) also, the fact that all outpost supply runs you do are completely wiped whenever you change nation allegiance, I'm never going to attempt to do Bastok or Sandy's main storyline.


Anyway, this was brought up by me completing the re-questing all my Runic Portals (again) on Cuddles.


I opted for the nasty orange AF since it gave decent HP and defense in case I caught some aggro on the way.
Most were relatively easy to get to, even the dreaded Ilrusi Atoll had an alternative route to get to that I was previously unaware of, which bypassed the need for a Lamian Fang key and the terribly irritating Soulflayers. I still took a death from the imps just outside of the Staging Point, but I anticipated this happing so made sure to bring a Reraise scroll. I wasn't too happy about it because I wanted to repeat my original MGS-esque moment by sneaking past them undetected. Alas, one of them cheated and spotted me through a pillar so I had to resort to Leeroying my way through and putting up RR before I went down. On the plus side, I managed to cap evasion from the few hits I took (and parried one attack with my warp cudgel!).

SE really made a wise move with these Portals, and especially Nyzul isle putting them in close proximity of several Exp camps, and the fact Nyzul is a myriad of tunnels/portals to pretty much every area in Aht Urhgan allows for safe and easy access. Good stuff. My only gripe with Runic Portals is the fact they require 200 imperial standing per use (for non-captains), which certainly adds up with regular Salvage and the fact I've not done much meriting for a long while. It would be nice to see perhaps a discount on cost for higher ranked mercinaries (maybe just a 50% discount for Sergeants and higher), and it would be even better to see a similar discount in points cost from the coin vendor who hands out Aht Urghan currency.

Also, Cuddles has travelled back to the past in order to sign up to Bastok's forces, and get himself some sprinter's shoes (another smart introduction by SE, especially considering it works alongside other movement-enhancing gear so not to upset those that have already got some). I decided to activate some Maws/Teleport crystals along the way;


I'm tankful for Monomi and Tonko, I saved so much money using those rather than having to use Powders and Oils, considering I used maybe 1/4 of a stack of tools (99 to a stack), which would have been 20k or more in oils and powders (12 to a stack), and the tools only cost about 4~5k per 99, which is very nice. Not to mention, they both always lasted the same duration (maybe this was just luck on my part) so I never had to waste resources re-casting invisible, only to have sneak wear off seconds later and re-cast both of them yet again.

Wings of the Goddess offers some of the best methods of transportation to date in FFXI, firstly there's fast ways to access past beastman strongholds (Recall-Jugner/Pashh./Meriph.) and the respective areas they are situated in, but also Maws in every area that is situated in both the past and the present (although you have to 'activate' them all in the past), Retrace - a spell similar to Warp II that takes you to your allied nation in the past (I'd really like to see a spell that takes you to your home nation in the present, but chances are it won't change much for me unless it's a RDM spell or a low-level BLM spell). Finally, the best part about fast travel from WotG is the area-warps offered by Campaign Arbiters, which require only that you have previously entered that particular area, and each area offers a warp back to your home nation, all for a small sum of (easily obtainable) Allied Notes.

Other major influences on my travel habits include the regular use of the 'pay warp taru' Kaduru-Haiduru, who offers transportation to your home nation for a small fee unlike his brother, Shihu-Danhu, who may - or may not - warp you to Jeuno or the surrounding area for free. Also, the introduction of NPCs in each major city who will warp you to Whitegate for a paltry sum of 300gil (after completion of an irritatingly time-consuming quest) the existance of such NPCs has allowed me to set my Home Point back in Windurst, allowing me to make quick use of Outpost warps/Whitegate warps/whatever.

I never got the Gustaberg Maw done, as Flam was camping Shikigami weapon so I decided to log at the Gustaberg zone and go back on Kaya to assist (plus I had sky soon, and this was en-route). All went well.


Sky was farming, until a number of people showed up and we decided to do a Kirin, on which hate was quite shakey at the start, due to lack of NIN/DRKs as we were farming. We used to have a ton of spare tanks to swap in/out should any die, but recently we've had 2 at most, and when one goes down all we have left is PLD/WARs to step in. :/


Kirin decided he wasn't too fond of me for some reason, and just decided to run over to me, do a TP move, cast a spell at the NINs then start chasing them, and TP me again on the way past. I hadn't really done much to get hate either. Made me giggle seeing him do deadly hold for 0 though, must have done less than 350 damage to not break stoneskin. How strange.

I got a shining cloth out of it though, which is going to go towards my 'saving for cursed gear so I can afford it when I get the abjurations' fund, mainly aimed at a Shura Togi for Cuddles (if I get him sky access :x).

Splooosh!

Sea Access!
I was just about to log off, when I saw a 7-5 shout in Whitegate so joined, and as we were only 2/6, I asked around to see if anyone was available to help.
We ended up with 4 people helping and only the initial two of us who actually needed the run. Credit is due to Nemezar, Xarp and Flam for coming to help me, also a BLM, Xadib, came to help as well - many thanks to all. :D


The fight went very smoothly, and quickly (so I forgot to take screenshots) and was over before chainspell wore, which I used because I'd only managed one haste before everyone engaged and needed to catch up. Nobody took any damage for the first 50%, so I decided to throw a few nukes in - prompting Xarp taking a skillchain to the face, seconds before we won anyway.

Xarp gave me a quick introduction to sea mobs afterwards, showing the only aggressive mobs to be 'Sharks' and 'UFOs', naturally these aren't the actual names of them but they are appropriate enough considering their appearance. It's nice to know you don't have to bother with Sneak or Invisible to avoid aggro, just have to remember not to run underneath or over the UFOs and sharks respectively (I don't know the actual names, you have to aggro them to be able to target them). It's a weird feeling entering a new area that you know nothing about, and definitely refreshing in an MMO- it's been a long while since I've had something new and different like this.


Of course, my first time in a new area couldn't come without at least one death. I managed to spawn a bunch of mission NM's when wandering around and checking everything I found. Giggles ensued.

New endgame area means new gear! As well as new endgame events that I already do too much of, so I won't be bothering with Sea stuff just yet or at least until I get CoP finished. Aside from a couple of capes, I don't really need anything from Sea stuff, so it isn't really a priority at the moment. Not to mention I now need to start getting ancient beastcoins for stuff like a Brutal/Loquacious Earrings, which will cost 750k~ if I buy them all, and will have to join a Limbus linkshell (yet more events) in order to get AF+1. Ugh.


Nom nom nom nom. But 750k? Ouch.



Assaults!
I joined a Preemptive Strike assault pick up group, which grants less points for the same number of people as Lamia 13 (900 vs 1080 both with 4 people) with them both being of the same rank, of similarly (low) difficulty the only explanation for this differing point reward is that SE hates me and wants to make it as hard as possible for me to get the 40k points I want from Mamool Ja Staging point. So far, I've amassed 10k points putting me half way to my next objective, which I think may be Amir boots:


A decent piece I'd like to ding into when I get DRG up, which will probably take me as long to get as it will to level DRG into the 70's. Alternatively, I may get Pahluwan seraweels which would serve well on DRG as well as being usable for my lolmeleeRDM.



Cuddles!
Is 4/5 on MNK AF now (thanks to the handy WoTG access to Garlaige Citadel, allowing anyone to find a coffer solo).


Glad I remembered to go back for my warp cudgel, I've had a habit of forgetting it recently. I only need the AF legs now, and since they're not particularily useful for party/DD play, I don't think I'll rush after them but I would like to complete the set at some point.


I'm glad that Campaign-involved beastmen aren't agressive to people who aren't participating, else things could have gotten ugly.
I've still got to finish getting all his areas/Maws/Teleports and Runic Portals, so I'll have plenty to do while looking for a party (perhaps runic portals should take priority, I don't see anyone exping in WoTG areas just yet, as good camps are yet to be discovered). Although getting some sprinter's shoes will be my next move, since that's going to speed everything up.

WoTG battlefields, /BLU and DRG.

In between no drops from Salvage, crap drops from sky and dynamis, and general inactivity across the whole server, not much has really happened. Although some guy in my Dynamis shell went to do 7-5 in the middle of a run, which was especially annoying because I didn't go.

Otherwise, I've gotten an unusually large amount of parrying skillups here and there, which got me up a couple of levels over the weekend.

I carried on with the Bastok wing of the WoTG story quests, and got up to the Quadav BC that I went to help Xarp with a while back (but was unable to enter) since he said he had no trouble beating it and that they never broke stoneskin, I decided to try out RDM/BLU.


Apparantly it's not quite as easy if you charge straight in and round up as many mobs as you can. They broke through stoneskin before I realised that phalanx and cocoon had worn off upon entry. Nothing to panic about, I thought as I reapplied my buffs (after a few interrupts) and continued the fight.

Stoneskin did break again a few times, despite having about 650 defense (maybe food would have helped?) Dia II probably wasn't helping things either. Now, I knew that the Quadav would scatter if I took out the leader - what I wasn't aware of was the fact that all of them were WHM's and spammed cures on him...
I had to use Chainspell in the end and spam Bludgeon on him until he died (what a pain).


And off they went - it was just a matter of chasing them down and taking out small groups after that. Apart from the small hiccup at the start (down to overconfidence more than anything), it was a very easy mission.

BLU is an ok sub, it didn't really get a good test run though due to the shakey start but I'll try it for skilling up when I get the chance, I have a good impression that it'll work well. I don't like the relatively short duration of Cocoon, it being only 90 seconds it's a pain having to recast it that often. Head Butt can still stun, Bludgeon can still do decent damage for its MP cost. Not really tried Wild Carrot or Healing Breeze on RDM/BLU yet, but I hear they're really MP-efficient cures.

Good stuff.


I failed to take any decent screenshots, so here's one I took by mistake.
I began leveling Dragoon finally, reaching level 13 and subsequently de-leveling to 12 the next fight (I hope this is not going to be a regular occurence on all my low-level jobs). I chose to level in Giddeus primarily because it was fairly close to Windurst and I expected at least some Even Match mobs to be there so I could cap polearm (which was waaaay below the cap at level 10). I was at least successful in capping polearm by level 12, and got to mess around with healing breaths and such. Healing breath being an integral part of DRG soloing, I might go into it in more detail some other time, but I'll say that it's pretty lousy at this level.

Oh, I called my NPC to tank (who had Cure II at level 10...slightly overpowered?) and had a little 3-man party going with him, myself and my wyvern.

I'll be taking DRG to 50 or so before I need to level Samurai for a sub, so I'll have a good idea by then if I like it or not. However, I've got exams in a week or so, so FFXI will have to take a back seat for a while.

Nothing to report.

...or so I thought. Initially, I only had this to share:


Leveling my mule to 5, she was 4 to begin with so it wasn't much of a bother despite resting in front of a Tough Orc and being chased back to the city by it. In my elation of reaching the gates with only 8HP left, I announced my success to the linkshell, only to be beaten down half a second later by the Orc (that seemingly did some kind of ninja-warp or pos hack to catch up) that was on my tail. All the time, the city guards just watch the incident occur right in front of them and do nothing to intervene. Bastards.
That's a small niggle I've always had about the game; that the NPC guards at city gates and outposts do NOTHING to help you if you're being chased, or in fact do nothing when a beastmen is stood right outside their outpost, staring them in the face. Bah!





I went on a BLU spell-hunting binge to catch up some as I'd been neglecting my spells for a while. Mainly just needed Wild Carrot, which meant Bibiki Bay was the first port-of-call to learn it from Goblin pets.
Second was Claw Cyclone (which ended up being worse and more expensive than Bludgeon) was next, from a trip to Jugner Forest. Since I was close, I figured I'd head to Carpenter's Landing to try for Soporific as well.



I actually enjoyed learning these spells, as they each only took me two or three kills (unlike the few hundred beetles I went through for Power Attack) and I got to travel to some nice and varied zones to learn them.





What I didn't enjoy, however, was this:


I a rare-ish NM that spawns on the boat ride around Carpenter's Landing once every 12 hours, and only between 20:00 and 4:00 Vana'diel time. Naturally it pops when I have no hope of defeating it as a level 32 BLU. It can drop some level 50 ninja or red mage JSE worth 200 and 30k respectively. So I did a quick job change after learning Soporific and came back as RDM. Checking the wiki entry while waiting for the boat told me that it wasn't going to pop again for another 12 hours (even if it hadn't been killed previously) so I let out a /sigh and then go back to BLU.

Eventually ended up making a pretty good party; PLD WHM BLU COR SAM and DRK, which got me to 37.


The PLD left early, and since there was nothing to replace him, we just carried on as 5 for a while, which turned out pretty well anyway with the SAM and COR tanking mostly (I couldn't get hate off him, it was rather strange) but whatever works, I suppose. It was also nice to see that everyone was capable of playing their role well, and as a result the party didn't suck. I knew it could be done. :)

However, it was not without loss, as I chucked away Cargo Crab Colin's rare drop with a heavy heart, as it was no longer needed and a Centurion's Sword is superior in 30-caps anyway. I hope that Colin might happen upon it again on his travels between pop windows and be reunited with his precious treasure.