Leveling: Kiki's DRK goes to the Jungles (25-28)

I had the day off on Friday, and spent all day in the Jungles levelling my DRK. It was pretty wretched at times, but I did go from 25 to 28. Used 9.5 hours worth of food, but it was a total of about 11.5 hours, with lots of regrouping, and waiting for raises and stuff. Died 4 or 5 times, almost always from Goblin aggro, which wiped out 4-5 party members each time. It reminded me of why I really don't like the Jungles very much.

A Rank 8 THF and I convinced my first party to head to the Yuhtunga Outpost, but as soon as we got there, our WHM said "I have to go". Since there were no WHMs looking, we disbanded. You can't really fight the Furriers without a WHM.

My next party was led by the worst RDM in the history of the game. He was our main healer, yet wouldn't rest for MP between fights, and he was actually the puller most of the time (I offered but was told he wanted to). After a couple of near-death experiences for the whole party, I ran into town and switched my sub to RDM instead of WAR, to help as a back up for healing (we had the "good" camp right near the zone into Kazham). However, the RDM decided that I was now the main healer, with my pathetic MND and low powered cures. :eyeroll DRKs should be smacking the monsters, not trying to keep everyone alive. I didn't even have Cure II yet. He used Regen only once, and that was on himself. I believe one reason he wouldn't rest was because he wanted to use his TP. :sigh

This party morphed over the hours, and moved to Yhoator when some of the group hit 28. It was really awesome for a brief time, when we had NIN/WAR, NIN/WAR, BLM/WHM, BLM/RDM, BRD/WHM, DRK/RDM. No downtime, and nice chains, all for 200+ exp. Unfortunately, that configuration only lasted for about 30 minutes.

In the final configuration before I left (SMN/WHM, RDM/WHM, MNK/WAR, NIN/WAR, BLM/WHM, DRK/RDM), we had a nice Compression/Transfixion skillchain going with Shadow of Death -> One Inch Punch -> Blade: Rin. Not sure it was the greatest skillchain to use on the Mandragoras, but it sure looked cool. :-)