A day of much loss, much gain, and a few screenshots (FFXI mostly)

[thistlechaser]

So tired. Just a quickie post because I'm tired. So tired. Did I mention I'm tired? Zzzzz.

Okay, that's about the end of the non-FFXI content of this post, so go ahead and skip the rest if you're not interested in gaming stuff. I thought I'd write more than that, but this whole tired thing is getting in the way.

I don't recall what I did yesterday (I'm sure it was fun stuff with the people I like! And I'm sorry I forgot!), but today was jam-packed with stuff. I woke up and hopped onto the &*()$&%)(! ferry to %*$&!% fish. I've not fished in FFXI in a number of months, and the time away did NOT make it any more enjoyable. I fished maybe two hours before my hands went numb and my wrists hurt so bad (even with the controller). And oh yeah, I almost died, too. (I was WHM/BLM for teleporting, sneaking, and warping -- not my main job.) Got a few fishing skillups and a fewer number of woodworking ones. (That's why I was out there, trying to break rods so I could fix them and skill woodworking.)

So after that I puttered around till it was time for static. Not to toot our own horn, but man do we rock. We got... 14K XP in 4 hours? Something close to that. I hit 55! Yay! Yay! Yay! No buffer at all (I'm like 11 into level :P ) but yay! 55! I got to wear my new armor! Look how well it all matches! Gah! I finally match! I got new body, neck, pants (pants! No more subligar!), and two earrings! And best of all, it all matches! :D

Our static must have gone on for more than 4 hours (2:30 to 6:15... I keep doing the math, but my tired brain keeps telling me that that's 4 hours-ish), because I was so totally exhausted after it. We were killing crabs non-stop, no downtime for MP or anything. 4 hours can't be right, for as tired as I got. (So hard to see the screen. zzzzzzz)

After the static we went and did something with a LS group. I really have no idea what our goal was, other than maybe gold orc masks? We went to the Mon-Cave-whatevers (too tired to look it up, that higher level in Davio... Davio... whatever) and killed orcs there for a while. I got like 5 levels of marksmanship, so I was very very happy. (I've been wanting to skill that, and those orcs were the perfect level.) I'm still curious as to why we were there though... but whatever the reason, I was happy to have been able to help out!

Then after that *pant*pant* I went to help with RSE things. The wonderful still-wearing-subligar Jaide needed his, so we went into that horrible, horrible Ordello's Cave (I think I spelled that one right?) to do it. Whoever designed those stairs needs to die. And during the helping, I got another piece of my RSE, too! I was sorry I couldn't go back out and help more, but that whole tired-thing...

Very very unusually, I saw TWO NMs today! And this is where that "loss" thing came in. While we were in the Ordello's Cave, Stroper Chyme popped right in front of me! (This is just a pictue of him from later in the night, I hadn't taken a screenshot at the time.) I was alone with him for like 15 seconds! But I was so surprised and worried he was higher level than I could handle, someone else had time to use Flee and grab him. Bah. He was TW-- (how was I able to check a NM?), so I could have handled him fine. I kicked myself over that for the rest of the night. (I've been thinking about making my own sniper's so I can have them self-signed, so the ring he dropped would have been perfect.)

While XPing, Amemet popped right next to us! And again, I was the first person there! I /poke'ed him and Ead /welcome'ed him before the gilsellers got there and grabbed him. No clue if he was our level or not, but an... um... thing happened and our WHM ended up dead so we couldn't have even tried if we wanted to. (We never, ever, ever have deaths in our static. This was a totally not-related-to-XPing thing. Not Ceh's fault, either!)

Perfect day in Rabao (full sized screenshot) A picture I took while Draque and I were waiting for our static to gather. A pretty perfect screenshot, if I do say so myself! You can really get a sense of the place, and the random guy crafting in the front adds pretty color.

That's it! So tired. I'd like to watch a Bleach ep, but bed calls. Zzzzzzz.

Comments

[loneguardian.livejournal.com]

Chyme isn't an NM, it's just a mob that happens to drop (RAREly) an extremely good item. Kinna like you can farm the whole lizard set of armor in Davoi, and chainmail stuff in the jungles. ;3

[loneguardian.livejournal.com]

Also: Chyme has like... 4-5 spawn spots. Spawn repop timer is 12 minutes. Archer's ring is like 1/1000 chance to drop. z.z It's a pain in the ass.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Oh! Merlee did say how low the chances of getting the ring was, but I had still thought it was a NM at that point.

This situation shows the one thing about myself that really, really annoys me in this game: I'm too damned cautious. I could beat any mob in the zone, even without armor or a weapon, but I worried if it was a NM that it might be tougher (but if it was a NM then why did I bother to hesitate and check it?). I should have just pounced on it... but I had no death buffer at all... bah!

[draymor.livejournal.com]

The toughest mob in Ordells is really the Morbolgar (sp) which is a ~lvl 50 NM Malboro.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, and we had a party so we likely could have taken even that. Oh well! Next time I'll snag it.

[niffy.livejournal.com]

You missed it. After you left, that gilseller warrior party started looking for chests even though they knew we were doing RSE. ^^; We claimed chyme in front of them several times, but finished all four patterns. rawr.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Gah! Oh, I would have been so pissed at them if I had been there! And that doesn't even make sense: If they had popped a chest you would have had to stay in the zone longer while waiting for a new one...

*beats on the gilsellers*

[kellios.livejournal.com]

*grins* Don't ever plan on stopping either if I can help it!

And thanks so much for helping! *tackles* Finally we get to party together in something other than Eco-Warrior =P

Two and a half hours to finish all the RSE stuff, and that was even with gilseller interruption. How cool?

~~Jaide

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's very good! (Both the time to finish and that you'll continue to go subligaring!) Congrats on getting it all! :D *snugs lots*

[yshyn.livejournal.com]

Meh, I guess it doesn't matter so much about dying. It's the first death I've had on WHM since my late thirties, so I suppose the streak had to be broken sometime. Also, since I didn't realise I was ahead of everyone, it doesn't matter so much that I died. Silly Ashn for not realising that I couldn't cast when he was standing next to an Elemental though. ^^

I can't quite work out why I thought you were all ahead of me at the start of the evening, and why I still think that was the case. I'm not exactly clear headed. I had to get up about four hours after static finished and at this point I'm lucky not to burn myself on the kettle. x.x

So while I'm very happy to be 55 and one level away from my leg warmers, it occurs to me that I now have to find a way to get for raise 2. *cries* At least it's not raise 3? How do people feel about not having me with RaiseII until I get ReraiseII? Only fair. :P

<- (tight-fisted) procrastinator

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Silly Ashn for not realising that I couldn't cast when he was standing next to an Elemental though. ^^

That whole situation annoyed me some. I hope he learns not to go running off again...

I can't quite work out why I thought you were all ahead of me at the start of the evening, and why I still think that was the case.

Maybe you're a time traveler? ;) Weeks ago I was the leading edge of the static, then I had one death and Ead and I got even, then I had more deaths (and Ead must have as well) and you became leading, then Ashn joined up and he became leading.

So while I'm very happy to be 55 and one level away from my leg warmers, it occurs to me that I now have to find a way to get for raise 2.

I've been watching the LS a lot, and it seems like WHMs mine more than anyone else. I suppose that makes sense, since they can't farm as well?

[yshyn.livejournal.com]

I usually mine, though recently I've been persuaded to try crafting, and I'm holding gear for avatar attempts, and now I've something like 70/70 and 44/45 on all my slots again. I don't have any room to go mining (to make it worthwhile I need to leave everything except field gear at home). I really need to get back to working at it, though it was really only profitable if I ran across gold or darksteel ore.

I suppose I should try other areas, like Gusgen. I'm still at the point where I'd need Invisible in Oldton, though that's where I'd really like to try.

[sylf.livejournal.com]

Yeah, mining is a great method for earning gil as WHM (or BLM, or anything that depends mostly on MP as your source of firepower). Once you hit 60, Cehra, the world is pretty much your oyster in terms of mining - Oldton Movalpolos is *almost* completely safe (maybe more around 62-63 for complete aggro-free), and you can mine Ifrit's Cauldron "safely" (i.e. as safe as you can get) if you sub Ninja and use Tonko:Ichi as your Invisible source. Just cast Reraise2 and you'll pop right back up. :) (er... I know dying isn't such a happy event, but with RR2 up you don't lose *too* much EXP, as opposed to RR1 which kinda sucks or just respawning which is very icky.)

Also, mining ores is a *great* way to get smithing and goldsmithing up into the 20s quickly, since you get a lot of iron, silver, and the stuff below it that you can use to skill up on. When you get to Oldton and mine up Moblin stuff, that can be EXTREMELY useful to have. I've been desynthing Moblin Mail with my goldsmithing skill of 28 and I've gotten the HQ3 result several times (gold ingot, about 80,000g).

Since you're practically at that point that these methods are available, it's something that might be worth checking out. :)

[draymor.livejournal.com]

Well since you're in a static you may be able to get away with putting R2 off for a level or two, but anymore than that and "accidents" really start to hurt.
I got some of my gil for R2 from a really lucky mining trip in Gusgen, not sure how the Gilseller situation is on your server but it's not too hard to outsmart them sometimes. [ camped spots you can't really do anything about, but at 55 you should be able to run around the lower levels without aggro. Most people will run around in a circle hitting all the points, but on Fullmoon they recover somewhat faster. You can try breaking the circuit and go in a different direction, might find some pleasant suprises ]
The rest I scraped up selling CP gear. Had about 34k stored up and the IM legs sell for about 100k each pair on Lakshmi. Two of those and Bam! R2 in the spell list.
Gardening is nice too if you have the patience.

[pomr.livejournal.com]

But did you do anything exciting?

*flees!*

J/K! Sounds like a busy day. No wonder D looked so tired.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Ha ha ha. :) You're lucky I'm too tired to chase you down and...zzzzz.

[kamalloy.livejournal.com]

*eyes the Royal Knight's set* Thistle looks... good. Really good. How is this possible? ^_~

Congrats on all the stuff! RSE marathons can be really fun (although ours involved multiple Cehra-deaths, way back when, but she's more than sufficiently recovered, it seems). A shame I wasn't around to help; doing stuff with you guys is always great fun. ^_^

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Heehee! I do look good (finally!), don't I? :)

And yeah, I heard about Ceh's trouble with it! Jaide got two pieces with no deaths, but I went to bed after that so I don't know how the last two pieces went. Hopefully well!

[metron-ariston.livejournal.com]

(pants! No more subligar!)

Boo! *g*

[linmayu.livejournal.com]

"boo"? I was thinking more along the lines of "omg thank Altana." ^^

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Ha, yes! :)