Almost back to normal~

Christmas was nice and uneventful, and soon we'll all be back to normal life again! No more flashing lights everywhere, no more annoying music (outside of work anyway), and soon it will be safe to go shopping again!

After opening gifts and talking to family on the phone (they're all on the other side of the country) I leveled RDM on FFXI. Was a long, long, long day. Started partying before 9 AM and didn't finish until after 10 PM. Zzzzz. Unfortunately the last hour was a total and unnecessary waste: We were in the Jungles and someone suggested moving camps, so we did... and then she died. And since we had moved so far away from the other parties, no WHMs would come raise her. So we had 45 minutes of downtime while a member went back and switched to WHM to raise her. 45 minutes of standing around after 12 hours of XPing was really, really bad. But hey, I hit RDM 30 and got out of the Jungle!

I had hoped that today would be another day of partying like that, but it seems not to be the case. Few people in my level range are online and there are no parties. I might just take my flag down and go do something else. (I'd sort of like to get a few more levels though...)

Playing a mage really gives you a different view on things: While I hate hate hate NIN tanks as a melee/DRK, I love them as a mage. Makes my life so easy! It's not like I have to worry about them keeping hate or not, since it's not like I'm going to get hate. (Apparently the things I cast get next to no hate. I can paralyze, blind, slow, gravity, poison, dia, and silence if necessary, all cast without a delay between them, and the mob never even glances my way. I don't nuke much, since my MP doesn't usually allow for it.)

I don't like being main healer much (if I wanted to do that I could play WHM), but I don't mind it now and then.

Oops, got an invite. Heh. Posting this now! Oops, I had some screenshots, but I guess I'll post them later.

Almost back to normal~

Christmas was nice and uneventful, and soon we'll all be back to normal life again! No more flashing lights everywhere, no more annoying music (outside of work anyway), and soon it will be safe to go shopping again!

After opening gifts and talking to family on the phone (they're all on the other side of the country) I leveled RDM on FFXI. Was a long, long, long day. Started partying before 9 AM and didn't finish until after 10 PM. Zzzzz. Unfortunately the last hour was a total and unnecessary waste: We were in the Jungles and someone suggested moving camps, so we did... and then she died. And since we had moved so far away from the other parties, no WHMs would come raise her. So we had 45 minutes of downtime while a member went back and switched to WHM to raise her. 45 minutes of standing around after 12 hours of XPing was really, really bad. But hey, I hit RDM 30 and got out of the Jungle!

I had hoped that today would be another day of partying like that, but it seems not to be the case. Few people in my level range are online and there are no parties. I might just take my flag down and go do something else. (I'd sort of like to get a few more levels though...)

Playing a mage really gives you a different view on things: While I hate hate hate NIN tanks as a melee/DRK, I love them as a mage. Makes my life so easy! It's not like I have to worry about them keeping hate or not, since it's not like I'm going to get hate. (Apparently the things I cast get next to no hate. I can paralyze, blind, slow, gravity, poison, dia, and silence if necessary, all cast without a delay between them, and the mob never even glances my way. I don't nuke much, since my MP doesn't usually allow for it.)

I don't like being main healer much (if I wanted to do that I could play WHM), but I don't mind it now and then.

Oops, got an invite. Heh. Posting this now! Oops, I had some screenshots, but I guess I'll post them later.

Continued... (FFXI)

So how did I leave the last post? 'I don't like being main healer... oops, got an invite!'? Well ha ha ha, there I was main healer again. Sheesh. :P At first it was a pain since we had a "normal" party, but after the first wave of replacing people it rocked, one of the best random parties I was in. We varied from 5 WAR/NINs or NIN/WARs and me to 3 NIN/WARs 1 RNG/NIN and me. Basically everyone had shadows other than me, so healing was pretty darned easy. We were hitting 200+ XP every kill, easy chain 5s. At the end we got down to a five member (for about an hour) and then a four member (for nearly an hour) and were hitting 200-300 per kill, easy fast chain 5 kills. Amazing. All of these figures were of course without the XP band, that thing wore off way way early on. Hit RDM 34!

The other good/odd/annoying (depending on my mood at the time) thing about NINs is that they cover so much of my own job. The party kept the dhalmels/beetles blind, paralyzed, slowed, etc... so all I needed to watch was HPs and dispel now and then.

Screenshot time~!

Oh boy, did I look ugly yesterday! For more than 300,000 gil, armor should NOT be that ugly. Luckily I got to sell it back today. Yay RSE! Yay cheap (free!) armor!

Those in our LS Escort static group know I have a very special relationship with lizards. And no, I didn't find what I was looking for...

Lastly, I'd like to take a moment to single out a very special player, a fellow who personifies the typical bad BLM stereotype.

I partied with him twice, both last night and today. Last night in the Jungles he first showed his true BLM colors: When he got hate, did he stop nuking? No, he nuked harder. In areas with multiple mobs, did he avoid AoE spells? Nope, because they do more damage! But that's just typical bad BLM stuff and wouldn't make him worthy of mention.

In the Jungles we battled Mandies. Mandies have AoE sleep moves. To wake someone up, you toss a cure onto them. Because he was BLM/SMN, he was useless and could not help wake anyone up. (Okay, we'll ignore the fact that he couldn't figure out how to stand out of range of sleep...) I suspected his subjob choice was because he didn't want to be called upon to cure (was lazy and selfish) but I didn't ask because perhaps he was doing it for more MP or something... (Does /SMN give you a deeper MP pool than /WHM? Yes?) Today he mentioned the real reason, with no prompting from me. Names not blurred because no one this selfish should be protected:



He stopped talking to me after that, which was a bonus because before that he had been just bragging and asking to buy stuff I was wearing...

Continued... (FFXI)

So how did I leave the last post? 'I don't like being main healer... oops, got an invite!'? Well ha ha ha, there I was main healer again. Sheesh. :P At first it was a pain since we had a "normal" party, but after the first wave of replacing people it rocked, one of the best random parties I was in. We varied from 5 WAR/NINs or NIN/WARs and me to 3 NIN/WARs 1 RNG/NIN and me. Basically everyone had shadows other than me, so healing was pretty darned easy. We were hitting 200+ XP every kill, easy chain 5s. At the end we got down to a five member (for about an hour) and then a four member (for nearly an hour) and were hitting 200-300 per kill, easy fast chain 5 kills. Amazing. All of these figures were of course without the XP band, that thing wore off way way early on. Hit RDM 34!

The other good/odd/annoying (depending on my mood at the time) thing about NINs is that they cover so much of my own job. The party kept the dhalmels/beetles blind, paralyzed, slowed, etc... so all I needed to watch was HPs and dispel now and then.

Screenshot time~!

Oh boy, did I look ugly yesterday! For more than 300,000 gil, armor should NOT be that ugly. Luckily I got to sell it back today. Yay RSE! Yay cheap (free!) armor!

Those in our LS Escort static group know I have a very special relationship with lizards. And no, I didn't find what I was looking for...

Lastly, I'd like to take a moment to single out a very special player, a fellow who personifies the typical bad BLM stereotype.

I partied with him twice, both last night and today. Last night in the Jungles he first showed his true BLM colors: When he got hate, did he stop nuking? No, he nuked harder. In areas with multiple mobs, did he avoid AoE spells? Nope, because they do more damage! But that's just typical bad BLM stuff and wouldn't make him worthy of mention.

In the Jungles we battled Mandies. Mandies have AoE sleep moves. To wake someone up, you toss a cure onto them. Because he was BLM/SMN, he was useless and could not help wake anyone up. (Okay, we'll ignore the fact that he couldn't figure out how to stand out of range of sleep...) I suspected his subjob choice was because he didn't want to be called upon to cure (was lazy and selfish) but I didn't ask because perhaps he was doing it for more MP or something... (Does /SMN give you a deeper MP pool than /WHM? Yes?) Today he mentioned the real reason, with no prompting from me. Names not blurred because no one this selfish should be protected:



He stopped talking to me after that, which was a bonus because before that he had been just bragging and asking to buy stuff I was wearing...