General: Weekly Jumble

Here are all the random things we've been up to in the past week that don't really merit full entries on their own.

Atop the Highest Mountains: Splinte is fast approaching 55 on her Warrior, and rounded up a few of us last week to help her out with Genkai 2, Maat's second limit challenge. This requires killing 3 NM creatures (the Boreal Hound, Tiger, and Couerl) in Xarcabard and retrieving a shard from behind them. We had Daden (WAR75/NIN37), Ryken (PLD69/WAR34), Itera (MNK68/RDM28), Grymalkyn (THF68/WHM34), Elboron (BRD68/WHM34), and Kiki (PLD68/RDM34) helping out young Splinte (WAR53/NIN26). I was planning on letting Daden do most of the tanking, but Grym's 1600 damage SATA+Dancing Edge on me meant I got to tank for most of the fight with the Hound. Stoneskin and Phalanx are great - I was a bit worried Flare was going to do me in, but it only hit for 200 damage. The fights were all pretty quick, and with both Elbo and Grym able to help with paralyna, even the AOE paralysis wasn't too big a deal. After we finished up, we headed to Castle Zvahl Baileys for some skillups and hoping for a coffer key for Splinte's AF as well, but never got the key.

Moon Reading: We've been doing the easy parts for Windurst Mission 9-2, and are now ready for the the final burning circle fight, but I'll cover those in detail when we actually complete the mission. It mostly involved running around to a lot of places for some cutscenes and key items. The fight will be much more challenging.

An Odd Tarutaru: One day, we were making use of the Outpost Teleport service in Port Windurst, and while standing near the NPC Rottata, a WHM31/SMN15 kept running back and forth between the zone and the fishing guild. We guessed he was probably doing the Bastore Sardine quest to raise his fame, possible for his mini-tuning fork avatar battles. As he ran to and fro, he kept using /stare and /check on people, so I /stared back. He /checked me, sent a /tell "!!!" and then tried to trade with me. I refused, he insisted, so I opened a trade window with him and he wanted to give me 6,050 gil. I cancelled and shook my head, but he insisted (Present), so I took it. I thanked him, but am perplexed as to why he felt it necessary to give me a present of gil. Maybe he figured I needed it after buying my Byrnie. /laugh So I tried to think of something I could give back to him, and decided to try to make a signed Solid Wand (level 32, good for WHM, BLM, RDM, and SMN, but most useful for BLM and RDM). I did just that, but have since seen him shouting (and posting on Allakhazam) for help with avatar fights as a SMN20, so maybe some other gift would be more appropriate. We "spoke" only in emotes and using the auto-translator, but after seeing his shouts and posts, he's definitely an English speaker. Then again, he was offering 100K for each helper for his avatar fights, so I'm not sure a token gift from me would make much difference to his character.

Fishing Guild Points: We fished up our limit of Monke-Onke on Friday night, and Grym went out on Saturday to catch our limit of Red Terrapin, and those brought us over the 100,000 guild points we need for our Fishing Aprons. Hurray! Unfortunately, we can't get those until we reach Fishing skill level 68 (I'm not yet 53, and Grym is under 51). At the rate we get skillups, that will be a long long time from now. In the meantime, we'll continue to turn in stockpiled fish should they come up as GP fish, and use the excess GP to buy the occasional Robber Rig.

Wild Card: Both Elboron and Grymalkyn needed coffer keys in Toraimarai Canal for the Wild Card quest (part of the Star Onion Brigade quests), so we headed in there and fought bats and skeltons for less than an hour and got the two keys we needed. I really love having stoneskin now as a PLD/RDM. And spirit taker's great as well. They both were able to find their coffers and will be able to pick up the next quest, The Promise.

Recluse Spiders: For The Promise quest, we need to get a rare/ex drop of Shoalweed from Recluse Spiders in Kuftal Tunnel, so we thought the three of us would head there to do just that. Unfortunately, it seems everyone on Lakshmi was in there with their NPCs farming spider webs. We decided to leave, but at least Grymalkyn was able to find a treasure coffer and finally get her map.

Shaman's Cloak: Having been stymied in Kuftal, we thought we'd head to Quicksand Caves and see if maybe Kiki could get the Shaman's Cloak she covets. There was a RDM74 soloing Centurio X-I, so we watched him kill it and went on our merry way.

Labyrinth of Onzozo: Next, we decided we'd go kill chest key droppers in the Labyrinth of Onzozo and get maps for the three of us. Since the place was empty, Kiki wanted to see if we could get Mysticmaker Profblix as well for the chance at a Moldavite Earring. We managed to get the three keys and chests we needed, though while we were looking for one of the chests we had a small aggro problem and since the three of us were scattered throughout the Labyrinth, it took awhile to quell the problem, but we survived. During this time, a RDM showed up to camp Mysticmaker as well, but when he popped in front of me, I got the claim. So Kiki's now officially O/1 on her Moldavite Earring.

Temple of Uggalepih: Saturday night, five of us headed to the Temple of Uggalepih. Itera and Wendell both wanted to get a Paintbrush of Souls and an Unlit Lantern for Zilart Mission 4, while Wendell, Grym, Elbo, and Kiki needed to get a key to get into a room for a cutscene for Windurst Mission 9-2. We had a fun time killing the Tonberries (stoneskin blocks Everyone's Grudge, but doesn't seem to block Throat Stab), and it didn't take too long to get the 3 keys. We headed to the outside of the temple and got two unlit lanterns from two Tonberry Jinxers, and headed back into the Temple to get our mission cutscene. With a bit of an aggro problem, we had Wendell escape us after we got our key items. While we were farming for our keys, we got a set of giant fish bones. Kiki added those to her new collection of items for the Opo-Opo Crown quest.

Levelling: The LLS Hobnobs with the Hobgoblins in Bibiki Bay (68)

Kitti's been having internet troubles, so Itera found a WHM67 (Reefermadness) to join the Low Level Static for exp Sunday night. The five of us were all 68, with less than a 5K spread between us now, which is probably the closest we've all been in a long time. Kiki was actually 10 exp ahead of Itera! Elboron, Yobun, and Grymalkyn all used their Empress Bands, so they made up another 1K exp during the night as well.

I really wanted to go back to Bibiki Bay, and it was crowded, but we were able to find a camp and managed to pull enough to keep us happy. I know Grymalkyn (our puller and my husband's character) was very frustrated at times, since the other parties would some times snatch a mob out of her hands (crossbow up before it went purple), but I think she managed to out-pull most of the time. We were fighting Hobgoblins and Catoplebas, with a couple bunnies thrown in for fun on as a chain #5. The other parties would never pull the Hobgoblin Blagger, so we included it in most of our chains. The evasion on those is so high (they're Thieves) that it can take awhile to kill them, but even as a chain #3 they weren't too much of a problem.

I thought things went quite well, and we had mostly chain #4s (for 284 exp), with quite a few chain #5s thrown in. I think we ended up fighting for 3 hours, and netted 13.5k without rings. Reefermadness hit 68 before we disbanded, and Kiki's now about 10K away from level 69 (new shield at 69: General's Shield, with +2 Enmity!). We did have to rest a bit for mp between chains, just because the Goblin bombs and AOE spells took a bit more out of us than "easier" prey. I also liked it because we were fighting IT(+/++)s, and I got to tank more than Itera. :-)

It was really nice having a WHM healer for a change. As a PLD tank, I think Regen III is my favorite spell, followed closely by Cure V (doesn't generate much hate and brings me out of the red really fast). And having Protect IV (which I will get at level 70) is a nice defense boost as well. Reefermadness seemed to enjoy bursting on our Light skillchain as well. I would frequently burst Flash, but not sure that makes it last longer or anything - it's just fun to do, and not as wasteful of my MP as Holy would be.

I'm a bit torn about my new Byrnie. I was using Defender pretty much the whole night (was getting hit for 50-100 on normal hits with it up), so it seems "silly" to wear something with +20 Attack on it when my attack is reduced so drastically by Defender (cuts over 100 points from it). However, the defense and vitality on the Byrnie are really close to those of my AF Surcoat, so really, +20 Attack is still +20 more Attack than I have without it on. And as a Tarutaru, I can use all the +STR I can get. I suppose one would really need to parse fights to see just what diffence a specific gear set makes. My intent for the Byrnie was to use it when fighting VTs (when I wouldn't normally be using Defender), but it should be fine for any EXP mob.

General: Armor Envy

Kiki tends to be a very practical Tarutaru, and doesn't find herself wanting specific items without valid reasons. However, with the introduction of the Homam gear several updates back, this all changed. She's fallen in love with it just for the looks. However, if she actually gets to 75, and if she ever makes it to Limbus and if she is able to obtain the items she needs to get this armor, it could actually be fairly useful for her PLD at level 75. Seems like too many ifs though.

Grymalkyn and Kiki ran into a Tarutaru named Alib-Mufalib, who was trying to recruit people in Bastok to join the mercenary company "Salaheem's Sentinels". He seems to be from some place called Al Zahbi, but Kiki doesn't know where that is. He was wearing some of the gear that Kiki envies, so she took a picture to put in her scrapbook.

General: Everybody Else Is Doing It

I've long had a to-do list for the game, and since last August, have been keeping it in my linkshell's forum to-do thread, but like Kirsteena, I like Halifirien's list in his blog, so I too am being a copy cat. I've put them on my side-bar to keep them handy.

General: Random Musings

We've been enjoying our now-weekly Escort Quests in Crawlers Nest, but last week Olavia got killed when we weren't paying enough attention. We ran back out to Rolanberry Fields and when we zoned back into Crawlers Nest, there she was, waiting as though we hadn't left her to die under the onslaught of several Exorays. This time we were more careful, and got her to her destination without incident. I believe we've seen all the different routes she can take now, and none of them seem bad. At some point we should try the ones in Eldieme Necropolis and Garliage Citadel, just to see what they're like.

Last week, we were killing things for weapon skills after Olavia left us, and ended up fighting some Easy Prey Wespes, and I couldn't believe it when two of them hit me for over 900 damage (each) sing Final Sting. Luckily I was pretty close to full health for both hits, and they die when they do that, so I was fine, but I would have been a bit embarrased to have such a weak little thing kill me in one shot.

On Saturday, we headed to Sea Serpent Grotto to help Erock farm his Golden Hakutaku Eye from Mindgazers, which ranged from DC to T for us, but with Trow (RDM/NIN), Talula (RDM/WHM), and Erock (WAR/NIN) being 73-75, they were killed pretty quickly by the 6 of us. We were camped behind the Ornamented Door, near where a few Sahagin NMs (Abyss, Coral, and Ocean) spawn, so we killed the Abyss and Coral Sahagins a couple of times and got a variety of bard scrolls. This was the first time I got to use Spirit Taker extensively, and I must say I really like it. I was getting back around 100 MP for every 100% TP. It will really cut down on resting for MP while doing farming and things like that. I'm eager to get to a level where I can use some of the high damage staves in the 70s.

After we got Erock's eye, we headed to the spawn area for Novv the Whitehearted, which can drop the Minstrel's Coat, a very nice piece of rare/ex body armor for Bards. Elboron would really like one, and some day we need to make a serious camping effort for it. When we got to the spot, it was empty, but suddenly several "known" RMT characters appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, so we knew it must be close to spawn time. Novv also can drop Siren's Hair, which goes for several million on the AH. Sure enough, we heard a provoke, and the RMTs got Novv. They seemed willing to let Elboron have the Coat, but apparently it didn't drop that time.

Missions: Doll of the Dead (Windurst 9-1)

After completing Mission 8-2, I headed over to the gate guard to see if they had anything new they wanted me to help out with. I wasn't found worthy until I donated 7 and a half stacks of crystals to the city's coffers, and then was able to pick up Doll of the Dead. They sent me to speak with Apururu at the Manustery again, where I found Ajido-Marujido has awoken. We had to head over to Heaven's Tower to talk with the Star Sybil, and learned that the Bearer of Darkness had been there. I ended up being asked to speak with Apururu's father, who had been imprisoned within Boyahda Tree and discover the truth behind the doll of the dead.

Yoran-Oran gave me some advice and said Mandragoras are crazy about Goobbue Humus, and I thought that might help me get the information I needed. We've already spent a good deal of time trying to find the Goobbue Humus without any luck, but on Saturday, Erock volunteered to help Elboron, Grymalkyn, and Kiki get the three Humus they needed by fighting the numerous Elder Goobbues. These range from VT to IT++ for the three of us, so having our RDM75/NIN37 friend was a huge help. We figured we'd have to wait until we were capable of handling them as a trio in order to complete this mission.

We had a pretty easy time with the Elder Goobbues, as a foursome with Erock tanking as RDM75/NIN37, Elboron BRD67/WHM33, Grymalkyn THF67/WHM33, and Kiki PLD67/RDM33. Erock had shadows, stoneskin and phalanx to protect him, and with Elboron singing haste songs, his recast timers were really low. Kiki got hit with Beatdown once, for over 600 points, so I can see these being tough for exp parties our level. The Goobbues have an AOE silence move, so we went through a lot of echo drops, but after a couple of hours, we got the three Goobbue Humus we needed, along with a nice chunk of exp, a few tree cuttings and pieces of wisteria lumber. It was so nice of Erock to help us out with this!

The three of us headed down to the Mandragora Wardens and bribed them with our Humus, and they let us in to talk with Apururu's father.


I went to give Apururu the information back in Windurst, and she asked me to go check on things at Full Moon Fountain. I switched to my RDM60/BLM30 for sneak and warp and made my way through Toraimarai Canal to the Full Moon Fountain, where I learned that I'm the star of hope to save Windurst. I think they've got the wrong Tarutaru, but I'll do what I can. I can't believe I'm actually one mission away from Rank 10, though admittedly, it sounds like the next mission is fairly challenging.

New Title: Guiding Star

Missions: Rag-tag crew for Promyvions Mea and Dem

Friday night, we tried to put together a group of people to take on Promyvion-Mea for Ryken and Promyvion-Dem for Richelle. We had four volunteers to help them out, and ended up with this group:

Ryken WAR/MNK
Richelle WHM/BLM
Splinte WAR/NIN
Elboron WHM/BLM
Itera MNK/WAR
Tsakiki BST/NIN

There was some question as to whether or not we'd succeed, at least for Mea, but we were armed with 6 full sets of anima, the meds we'd need, and the will to win. I was 3/3 on both Mea and Dem, and for Mea, I really prefered tanking as WAR/MNK, since the time I tried WAR/NIN I ended up dead. Since we had a WAR/MNK and a WAR/NIN already, I thought I'd go as a BST. I really liked using BST for this, as the mob radar and wide scan made it so much easier leading the group to the Memory Recepticles and the Spire. Jug pets came in handy for the journeys to the spire as well, as well as for the bosses.

We started out with Mea, since it's the harder of the two. We made it to the Spire without to much trouble, and came face to face with the dreaded Delver. The fight was rather sloppy, and took a bit longer than I would have liked. Itera and Kiki both used their two hours, and I believe Splinte and Ryken did as well, but I'm not sure. At least three of us came dangerously close to death, but a few well-timed Terroanimas gave us the breathing room we needed to keep everyone alive. When it was all over, Ryken ended up in Lufaise Meadows, but walked to the Dem crag to meet us for Richelle's final Promy.

We still had several anima left, and Elboron had a full set of recollections, so he headed to Jeuno to get them made into anima for the Dem boss. We weren't very concerned about Dem, just because it always seems like the baby of the Promys. Once again, we had little trouble getting to the Spire (they're both so much easier than in Holla), and headed in to face the Progenitor, before our two hours were available again.

Ryken accidently entered first, and ended up in the ENM battle, but he quickly exited and Richelle activated the mission fight. This fight was a lot smoother than the Mea boss, but it did take a bit of time to get it killed. Richelle ended up in Lufaise Meadows, and the rest of us headed there to escort her and Ryken to the Tavnazian Safehold. It's been a year since I first completed the Promys, but every time I help someone else gain access to Lufaise Meadows, it reminds me of how I felt my first time there.

So, to sum up, the people who insist you must have a SMN or two plus a RNG or two for the Promyvion bosses are just sissies. :-)

General: New King of the Opo-Opos

For a Bard, the best head gear in the game is probably the Opo-Opo Crown, which can only be obtained through a quest in Kazham that requires the quester to get his or her hands on a wide variety of items, some of them rare/ex and a bit tough to find. The Crown's stats don't look that impressive, but when the wearer eats a Pamama, they end up with +7 CHR, +50 HP, and +50 MP. We've been helping Elboron with this quest, and he was finally able to complete it this weekend.

The items you need for the quest are:

a workbench
ten of coins card (drop from Ten of Coins Cardian in Outer Horutoto Ruins)
sands of silence (rare/ex from Yagudo in Castle Zvahl Bailey)
set of giant fishbones (rare/ex from Tonberry Stalkers in the Temple of Uggalepih)
wandering bulb (drop from Uttuku in Fei'Yin)
lucky egg (rare/ex from knight crawlers in the Boyahda Tree)
broken mithran rod
wyvern skull (rare/ex from hurricaine wyvern in Ifrit's Cauldron)
ancient salt (rare/ex from sand diggers in Quicksand Caves)
blackened toad (drop from brook sahagins in Sea Serpent Grotto)

As of last Thursday, he was still in need of the last 5 on this list. We headed back to the Boyahda Tree, hoping we'd get some Goobbue Humus from the Old Goobbue while we were at it, but he was nowhere to be seen again. So Grym pulled our first Knight Crawler, and there it was! Lucky Egg for Elboron! Since we were already there, and Kiki really wanted to get Spirit Taker (was at 211 staff skill and needed 215), we decided to stay for skillups. The Crawlers were a bit too low, so we fought Robber Crabs, and those did the trick. Spirit Taker is mine! I get back around 100 mp for 100% tp, which will really help when farming. I had switched out of my darksteel armor, and was better able as PLD/RDM to hold hate with more enmity on my gear.

Saturday morning, I took a Mithran Fishing Rod that Elboron had bought and set off to Qufim Island to break it. I had done this for Yobun months ago, and had good luck with sliced cod on the south cliffs, presumably on three eyed fish. However, I kept losing them because of lack of skill rather than breaking the rod. Since Grym needed some Gigant Squid for her sushi, I headed to the north cliff, and was able to quickly break Elboron's rod there, then switched to my Lu Shang's and got the two squid Grym wanted.

Late Saturday afternoon, Erock (RDM75/NIN37) took the three of us to Ifrit's Cauldron to get the Wyvern Skull Elboron needed. We'd never really been in there, so it was pretty cool seeing it for the first time. Erock led us to our camp, Grym pulled the first Wyvern, and what do you know, it dropped the skull! Both Grym and Elbo had forgotten warp items, so Erock led us safely out again. That place is really confusing, but perhaps some day I'll learn my way around.

Saturday evening, the three of us set out for Quicksand Caves to try to get the Ancient Salt from the worms there. We knew we had to go through one of the doors with a weight sensor, but we assumed that when people say you need "three tarutaru, or two humes/elvaans/mithra, or one galka", that two taru and a mithra would work as well. Sadly, we were mistaken. Yobun offered to come help later, but in the meantime, Itera logged in and came to our rescue. So the four of us fought worms for hours, with some Girtabs and Anticans thrown in for good measure. There are only 4 of the worms, 3 spawning alone in tunnel areas, and the 4th in a big room with Girtabs and Anticans. The salt refused to drop, and it got quite late, and Itera had to leave. After Itera left, we stuck to just the three worms away from the other monsters, since it was safer without Itera's extra damage. Finally, on the 5th kill, we got the ancient salt that Elboron needed. There was one more worm on that spawn cycle, so we killed it too, and yes, it too dropped the ancient salt, so Kiki now has one of the items she'll need if she ever decided she too needs her own Opo-Opo Crown.

Grym and Kiki logged out for the night, but Elboron, eager to finally complete the quest, tried to find the final item, a Blackened Toad on the Auction House. Unsuccessful, he headed to Sea Serpent Grotto to try to farm one, but didn't have much luck, so he logged out as well. In the morning, he headed back again, and got the blackened toad he needed and headed to Kazham to hand out all the items to the proper Opo-Opos. They were in awe of him, and crowned him as their King! All Hail Elboron, King of the Opo-Opos!

That 50 extra MP sure came in handy Sunday night when the LLS decided skeletons in Gustav would be fun. All the AOEs were a bit hard on our HP. :-)

Leveling: LLS in Gustav Tunnel vs. Bones (67-68)

Last night, Yobun (one of our two thieves) had a committment to help with an Optical Hat run, so we ended up replacing him with Latch, another MNK67 (this is a second character Vawn's been leveling to have the "perfect" duo buddy for his PLD75-BRD75 character). Since we had two Monks, I decided we should try fighting the Doom Guards and Doom Warlocks in Gustav Tunnel.

We made our way to an isolated and safe camp, and I ate my Black Curry which caused my husband to comment, "Um, what happened to 'no eating three hour food at a new camp'?"

We started in fighting, and it wasn't the best party setup (PLD MNK MNK THF SMN BRD), but we managed to survive. The Warlocks were especially nasty with their AOEs, and we'd often end up with the entire party in deep orange. We had a lot of resting for MP, and the exp was pretty slow. I think we were fighting for 2 hours and 15 minutes, and only managed about 8.5k exp. I think I liked the pugils better than the bones, but some of the skeletons did go down really fast. Itera, Kiki, Grym, and Elbo all hit 68, and Kitti made it to 63. Latch will be 72 before next Sunday (I think he's a bit obsessive compulsive), so that's the last we'll see of him in an exp party.

The thing I'm most excited about for hitting level 68 is that I will now have Stoneskin as a PLD/RDM. I think now I'm ready for our trio to take on the Recluse Spiders in Kuftal and get us the shoalweeds we need for The Promise quest.

Leveling: LLS in the Boyahda Tree (67)

Kitti joined the LLS this Sunday night with her SMN61. She's a bit low for the group, but as a main healer, that's really not a huge issue. If she decides to continue on with us, she'll probably level a bit to try to get caught up. Itera, Kiki, Elbo, and Grym were all 67, while Yobun was still 66, having not gotten any exp since our last LLS three weeks earlier.

Bibiki Bay looked full, and there was a party our level fighting lizards in the Den of Rancor (though without Stona, that might not have been the best idea), so we thought we might try Darters and Tarantulas in Dragons Aery. We trekked through the Boyahda Tree to Dragons Aery, and since there were spiders between us and the flies, we decided to try a spider on the Tree side of the zone, since they're probably slightly lower in level. So we buffed up and pulled a spider. Kiki ended up dead, so we decided that was a bad idea. It wasn't a problem with Sickle Slash - I got hit with that several times, but usually around 300 damage. It was just the double attacks and probably spider web slowness that kept me from getting cures off in time. Fortunately the spider was nearly dead when I died, so they killed it off with no further losses.

Note to self: don't eat three hour food when trying out a new camp.

We decided to head up to the upper level and camped near the Sleepga II quest spot and fought Steelshells the rest of the night, with one Water Elemental that aggro'd us. The prey were all VT, and we were killing them pretty fast, but never got a chain #5. We were a bit rusty, and didn't get our light skillchain going for a few fights. It wasn't the best camp, with crabs spawning on us while we were fighting, and Elbo ended up getting killed by one link. My provoke and flash weren't up and I never think to use Cover since Elbo's always running around. I feel so bad when someone else dies. Itera and I both ended up using our two hours to survive those two crabs.

I think we ended up with about 9.5k exp with rings for the evening (between 2 and 2.5 hours of fighting), putting Kiki a bit more than halfway through level 67. Level 75 seems so very very far away. I think we need to change the way we do things - we can be better than we are.

General: All Those Little Things

• A week or so ago, Elboron and Kiki were skilling up on the bats and Fleshcravers (warrior-type skeletons) near the Windurst Walls entrance of Toraimarai Canal, and Elboron finally got Spirits Within. I tried to get a picture, but it doesn't really capture the moment well.

• Grym and Kiki decided to farm ice clusters in Beaucidine Glacier to turn in for Rank Points so they could pick up Mission 9-1. We ended up getting 25 clusters in about an hour, which was even better than I expected. We ended up needing 7.5 stacks each to pick up the mission, and gave Elboron enough for his points as well.

• We wanted to get a Ten of Cups card for Kiki's Kind Cardian quest, and ran into a threesome trying to get the Ten of Coins. They implied that they were trying to get one for one of them for the Opo-Opo Crown quest, so we joined them to help out with Grymalkyn's TH2. They finally got their card and left, so we disbanded and kept waiting for the Ten of Cups, but one of them came back and asked if we needed any help. Since they were too weak, I said, thanks, but no, so he asked if we'd let him have the Coins, and we said sure. Later when we checked the AH, the person we "helped" with the card "for the quest" had sold it for 300k, and one of the other three was on the list of sellers as well. I guess you can't make any assumptions about other peoples' motives.

• Last week's Escort for Hire with Olavia only took about ten minutes. She took what apparently is the "easy" route, ending up in the exoray room on the top map. Once again we stayed awhile for skillups, but got frustrated with all the other people showing up wanting to fight the same mobs we were fighting (Crawler Hunters, Knight Crawlers). Itera and Kiki both got less than 900 from thier scrolls, but both Elbo and Grym got over 1400.

• I spent one evening solo farming recollections in Promyvion-Mea as a Paladin. It actually went pretty well, though it was slow. I rested for MP between each, just to be on the safe side. I didn't get any recollections, but I did get 3 Beastmen Seals. Friday night, we were planning to do Promyvion-Mea for Ryken, but ended up short a person. We were able to get the few recollections the group needed quite quickly though, so hopefully we can try again this coming Friday. I was planning to do the Promyvion as BST/NIN, and had a Hare Familiar helping with the farming. It's kind of fun seeing a bunny beating on the weepers and wanderers.

• We were able to get our Charm Wands +1 with Elboron. I was very disappointed that Grym's and Kiki's didn't get signed by Elboron. I guess you have get both the Charm Wand and the Charm Wand +1 with the same person to get the +1 signed, so Elboron's both are signed by Tsakiki, since she was with him for both.

• Christmas inflation seems to be over. Prices have been dropping steadily for a week (since about the time that SquareEnix announced that it had cancelled 700 accounts involved in Real Money Trading (RMT) and removed 300 billion gil from the servers). I've been checking the AH daily, hoping for a deal on a Byrnie, which had been 5-6 million before Christmas, and peaked at 13 million then leveled off at 11 for weeks. I would bid up to 6.1 million, never managing to get one, but last night, there were 10 listed, and the last two sales had been between 7 and 8 million. So I bid 1mil, 2mil, 3mil, 4mil, 5mil, 5.5mil, and 6mil. After so many weeks of seeing "You were unable to buy a Byrnie for 6,000,000 gil", I was rather shocked to see "You buy a Byrnie for 6,000,000 gil." I hope Kiki likes it! Compared to my AF body, I get 5 more HP, 3 more STR, and 20 more Attack, while I lose 1 DEF, 1 VIT, 5 Divine Magic skill, and 2 Enmity. I also lose 3 DEX and AGI, but that's less bad for a Taru than an Elvaan, I suppose. I'm hoping the STR and Attack more than make up for the Enmity, but we shall see.

Leveling: Just Another Nuke-Happy Tarutaru

One of my long term goals for Kiki is to get her BLM to (at least) 40, since it would be useful for BCNMs and other capped events. One thing I didn't realize was how much I'd actually enjoy it, so who knows, I may want to take it higher some day. It's kind of nice to be playing a job that uses Tarutaru strengths rather than needing to offset some weaknesses. With all the other things I have on my to-do list, I don't often find myself with a whole day to devote to a solitary pursuit, but Saturday was such a day, as neither Elboron nor Grymalkyn were planning on playing.

I spent an hour shuffling gear between characters, getting everything for my BLM31, as well as gear I could switch to at 32. I headed to Selbina to pick up the one scroll I would need (Blizzaga at 32), and then headed to Jeuno to do a bit of shopping to round out my gear, and grab some extra food. I had two sub-zero gelatos and 5 sweet rice cakes in storage, and wanted more sweet rice cakes, but ended up settling for a stack of melon pies.

For my shopping spree, I picked up a Baron's Saio for its +INT, upgraded my old Black Cape to a Black Cape +1, and got a morion tathlum (someone was trying to jack the price, so I kept checking over the course of an hour until another one went up, and got it for the going rate). I might have liked a pair of garrison boots for their INT, but there were none up. With the gear I already had, I now had +19 INT at 31, and would have +24 at 32, without food. I believe I could have had another +4 with garrison boots, eremite +1 rings, and the rare/ex sweet sachet instead of the tathlum, but at too high a cost when I've got other gear waiting for a few levels (Mannequin Pumps at 35, Wisdom Rings at 36). I set up my heal macro to swap in my Pilgrim's Wand, Baron's Slacks, Seer's Tunic, and Wizard's Earring for +mp regen while healing, ate my lunch, and put my flag up for a party.

After awhile, I got an invite from a SAM, and joined the party. We had a NIN, RNG, SAM, WHM, RDM, BLM, ranging from 31 to 33, with me as the baby of the group at 31. We headed off to Garliage Citadel and fought bats and beetles on the stairs. It was fairly slow, partially because of a lack of prey, but we worked pretty well together and it was nice group of people. No chains, and we were getting 200 for the kills. The NIN got killed once, when a very evil bat got in 4 double attacks in a row, and dropped the poor guy faster than the three mages could cure him.

It took me a couple of fights to figure out the hate threshold, and with me as the baby of the group, I was getting resisted a bit, so I used the mage-friendly trio of enfeebles: Burn, Shock, Choke. I'd wait until I felt hate was safe and start tossing off the element-appropriate spells. Like Halifirien commented in his blog last Friday, I felt like I wasn't doing much, but it doesn't help having the BLM pulling the mobs away from the melees, possibly spoiling weaponskills. When I leveled to 32 and had more +INT gear, I had to relearn the hate-line. Eventually, our NIN had to leave. He gave us an hour of warning, and we were actively searching for a replacement, but there wasn't one to be found. Our WHM disconnected and didn't return, so we disbanded, and I put my flag and started running back to Jeuno (my homepoint is typically in Windurst these days).

I wasn't even halfway to Jeuno when I got another invite, this time from a SMN. When I got to Jeuno, she had switched to her high level WHM, and whisked me off to East Altepa, where a WHM was waiting. She headed back to Jeuno and grabbed a SAM and dropped him off, then went back to pick up a NIN. A second BLM was taking the long way, as she didn't have the Altepa Gate crystal. We gathered together a bit north of the zone to Korroloka Tunnel, all level 32 or 33. We started in fighting the beetles, and chained them pretty well, but the exp was a bit low, especially after the SMN left and we had a THF34 to replace her. The SAM was a Japanese player, and was trying very hard to get the group functioning better than it was, and for the most part succeeded. He had quite the set of gear on, including a peacock charm, and we later learned that he had 5 jobs at 75: WAR, MNK, RNG, RDM, and NIN. I really respect his patience with our somewhat unruly party - trying to improve it rather than abandoning us. We were plagued with the typical AFKs and waiting for replacements that go hand in hand with most pick-up parties I've been in.

We ended up moving on to Desert Dhalmels (which elicited a (Death) (Fear) comment from the SAM), and did pretty well on them, though we did have a lot of trouble with a link that left 3 dead (proving the SAM's fears were well-founded). If a bunch of higher levels hadn't happened by, it would have been worse.

I usually turn on the filters for other peoples' damage when I play mage jobs, but I left them off this time. The other BLM in the party was a Mithra a level higher than me. I didn't examine her, but her visible gear wasn't giving her any INT bonuses, and she wasn't eating any food. I was consistently out-damaging her by at least 50% when we would use the same spells. I really was surprised that the difference was so great. Now I wish I had checked her gear to get an actual comparison of our INT. She was one of those BLMs that like to constantly be casting something, usually opting to open with Aero II on the dhalmels, causing a bit of scrambling of the melees. I ended up with two levels in this party, but was happy to get back to Windurt, nearly 12 hours after I left it.

General: The Elusive Old Goobbue

For Windurst Mission 9-1, Doll of the Dead, we need to get a rare/ex Goobbue Humus. This drops from both the Old Goobbues and the Elder Goobbues in the Boyahda Tree. After completing Mission 8-2 a week ago Saturday night, a number of us decided we should head to the Tree and see if we could get some of the Goobbue Humus we all would need.

We killed the Old Goobbue twice, which resulted in a single drop (yay for Wendell!), and after a bad experience with someone getting an IT++ Korrigan mad at him just as someone else pulled an IT++ Elder Goobbue, Kiki, Grym, and Elbo decided to call it a night and try some other time. Part of our group had managed to escape, while Kiki, Grym, and Elbo were left to their own devices. Fortunately we survived (Elbo was able to warp out with his Treat Staff, and Kiki and Grym made it to the Cloister of Storms zone), but I just didn't think the group we had would be capable of taking out the Elder Goobbues, especially not when Wendell (WHM) was supposed to leave soon. The group that escaped decided to take on Aquarius as they made their way back into the Tree, and painfully learned that a foursome with a PLD68, SAM62, THF66, and WHM65 shouldn't try to fight Aquarius.

I decided that Grym, Elbo and I could easily trio the Old Goobbue, and since Elboron needs a Lucky Egg from the Knight Crawlers in the same area for his Opo-Opo Crown quest, we could kill those while we waited for the Old Goobbue to respawn. So two evenings this past week, we spent about 4 hours total fighting dozens of Knight Crawlers, a handful of Robber Crabs, and one, yes, one Old Goobbue. No Lucky Egg, no Goobbue Humus. I don't know what the deal is with the Old Goobbue, but he was there when we arrived on Wednesday evening. We killed him, and there was still no respawn nearly two hours later when we headed home for the night. Thursday evening, the Old Goobbue was nowhere to be seen, and didn't put in an appearance during our two hours there. Fortunately, we've been getting some skillups (Kiki's staff skill is now 211), and exp (the mobs are pretty much all DC, with a couple EMs thrown in).

It's going to take us forever to get three Humus items that we need. Too bad the Elder Goobbues are so painful to exp on, otherwise we could convince the Low Level Static that we need to fight those.

Since getting PLD past 66 and having Phalanx with RDM subbed, I've been doing this sort of farming/hunting as PLD/RDM, and bought some gear to try out for it: Darksteel Cuirass (+VIT and +MP), Darksteel Cuisses (+AGI and +MP), and a Darksteel Cap (-1% Physical Damage). This would allow me to leave my AF in storage and free up a bit of inventory space as well. Since I've been trying to skill up staff, I used my Earth Staff for the minus physical damage, plus it does less damage than my battle staff, and when trying for skillups, you don't really want to kill the mobs too fast, especially if they're "good" ones. With my "boosting MP" gear, I ended up with about 586 MP as PLD/RDM, which is handy for our BRD/THF/PLD trio.

One problem with this gear set up is that I lose 6 Enmity by not wearing my AF. And even with both my Hercules and Mermaid's Rings on for +5 Enmity, both Elbo and Grym were getting smacked around a bit. So I think I'll keep my AF on going forward. As PLD/RDM without any plus MP gear, I still have over 500 mp, so it's not really that big a difference. It was fun playing dressup though. :-)

Missions: Promyvion-Holla

I haven't helped out with a Promyvion for months, and the linkshell has several people trying to get through them now, so I decided to help out with Promyvion-Holla last Friday night. I had done Holla three times, all successfully, with a variety of teams, but always with a PLD tank. For Mea and Dem, I prefer tanking as WAR/MNK, since it's easier to hold hate at level 30 by swinging a Great Axe, but for Holla, PLD just seems better. (I remembered one reason why when the boss put everyone to sleep when they didn't think they needed their posion potions yet. Cure the WHM to wake her up, and get back to tanking. I'd like to see a NIN do that. :-) )

We all met up at the crag, and I got in a fight (in /tell) with Splinte over my choice of job for the fight, since he felt "PLD isn't useful". I reminded him that I was the one who was 9/9 on Promyvions while he had only completed 2 successfully, and had had multiple failures. I've been irritable lately, and sniped that if he felt I was so useless I could find something better to do with my time, but I didn't abandon them, since they did need my help, as they had two WARs and neither wanted to tank.

Our party consisted of:

Richelle WHM/BLM
Ryken WAR/MNK
Splinte WAR/NIN
Lalandra SMN/WHM
Itera MNK/WAR
Kiki PLD/WAR

Ryken, Richelle, and Splinte all needed Holla, and the rest of us were there to help them complete it. We had to make two attempts to the spire, as our first time through we got trapped between two clumps of Empty on the third level and couldn't get away. 4 of us died, and since Richelle didn't have reraise up, we had to home point and regroup. I picked up another 5 hi-potions while I was in town (they're 7k each now, Grym and I have to go farm so she can make a supply for us), and headed back to Holla.

Our second ascent was smoother, though we had three "dud" Memory Recepticles along the way. On the final floor, we just made a mad dash for the Spire, with little aggro. It was a bit crazy, but it worked.

For the boss fight, we had 5 complete sets of anima, and set up the order for using them. We wanted to use the psychoanima first, since it intimidates the boss and saves the tank a lot of hits. Then when it starts using its special attacks, it was time to switch to hysteroanimas, which keeps the boss from being able to use special attacks. Terroanimas are held in reserve for a crisis. People always say the bosses don't use their specials until 50% health, but they do indeed use them earlier.

Since the Holla boss has an attack that strips buffs and food from its target, I was eating ginger cookies as "fake" food. I also had melon juice, selbina milk, and poison potion active. The poison potion was to wake me up when the Boss uses its AOE curse/sleep move. I had holy water for curse, and hi-potions to get some health back fast.

The fight went very well, with Lalandra using Astral Flow at half life, and Itera using Hundred Fists as well. It was kind of fun, as such things can be, and Splinte ended up in Lufaise Meadows. I chocobo'd from the Crag to the Vortex in the Dunes and showed him the way to Tavnazian Safehold. He was very excited to have finally made it through the Promys, and hopefully move forward through the rest of CoP.

Splinte keeps making comments about hurrying to get past 2-5, and since I've been on that mission since March, I find I get a bit huffy about such comments. Hopefully we'll get everything in place to finally try that soon with Grym and Kiki kiting as BST/NINs, Elbo as BRD, Itera as MNK, Splinte as WAR, and someone as WHM. I've had all these Yellow Liquids taking up mog space since September...

Events: Valentione's Day

Last Thursday was the start of this year's Moogle Event in celebration of Valentione's Day. After helping Splinte with his Warrior AF2 quest (killing a Quadav NM in Palborough Mines, and then a Yagudo Parasite in Castle Oztroja), Itera, Elboron, Grym and Kiki headed to Windurst to see if they could figure out the event.

The four of us ran around talking to the Valentione Singles, trading each other the chocolate heart halves from the NPC types that the singles were looking for (for example, the Tarutaru female single that Kiki talked to was looking for a nice Hume male, so Kiki got a heart half from Elboron, who got it from the Hume male single), took the pieces to the event Moogle to get joined into a whole chocolate heart, and returned it to the Valentione Single it belonged to. After we'd returned hearts to all four of our gender-specific NPCs, we headed to the Moogle to see what our rewards would be. Grymalkyn was rated Excellent, and was able to choose a Charm Wand as her reward, while Elboron and Kiki were simply Decent. Elboron could only get a chocobo pass, while Kiki could get a chocobo ticket or a chocobo pass. The Charm Wand has 10 charges and can be used once a day to cast reraise on someone else. The +1 version is like the Treat Staff II in that it can be used once every five days and recharges.

Over the weekend, Kiki traveled to Bastok to team up with Qimirpik, Grymalkyn's Bastok Galka mule. This time Kiki was rated excellent, and got her own Charm Wand, which was "signed" with Qimirpik's name. Qimirpik also got a Charm Wand, but he'd talked to the Moogle when Kiki was in a different zone, and his isn't signed.

Next Grymalkyn did the event with Qiwi, Kiki's Galka mule in Windurst. They both were rated excellent, and Grym picked the Romance Potion, while Qiwi got a Charm Wand signed with Grymalkyn's name. People say that you have to do the quest three times with excellent ratings in order to get the Charm Wand +1, so over the next few days we'll have to try to get this completed before the event ends. I hate getting all these rare/ex event items cluttering up the mog safe, but they will come in handy for those occasions when I've felt a scroll of instant reraise would be useful!

Missions: The Jester Who'd Be King (Windurst 8-2)

After completing Mission 8-1, we headed to the gate guards to get our next orders. Apparently we hadn't done enough for our nation, so we each had to donate over 6 stacks of crystals for the cause. The gate guard was then happy to give us the next mission, though it didn't sound like it was an official mission.

We headed to the Manustery to speak with Apururu. Her brother, Ajido-Marujido, is locked in a dungeon, and she asks for our help. Shantotto told her if she could get five of the Ministry rings, she could most likely open the door to the Dungeon of Darkness. Shantotto also made some not-so-pleasant remarks about taking advantage of a certain adventurer, but I always thought Shatotto was a bit evil anyway.

So we set about collecting the rings. Apururu gave us her Manustery Ring, then we headed to the Optistery to ask for Tosuka-Porika's ring. He was suspicious of our motives and didn't want to give it to us, but he changed his mind. Next, we headed to Davoi to get the Aurastery Ring from Sedal-Godjal. He actually wanted to give it to us without us needing to ask for it, since it was the power of the ring that allowed us to find him with the help of the talking doll in the previous mission. Then we had to head to the basement of Fei'Yin to get the Rhinostery Ring from Rukusu. She was surprised to see us, but seemed happy to help Apururu get her brother out of the dungeon. While we were there, we killed a bunch of Utukku to get a Wandering Bulb for Elboron's quest for his Opo-Opo Crown.

We headed back to Windurst to talk to Apururu and then Kupipi. We learned that Semih Lafihna has the Orastery ring, and has gone off to investigate something in the Outer Horutoto Ruins, and hasn't returned. Kupipi actually seemed a bit concerned about Semih Lafihna's safety.

Saturday night, we gathered together ten people on the mission, and two helpers, and headed off to look for Semih Lafihna and get the fifth ring. We had:

Ryken PLD68/WAR34
Emith BLM73/WHM36

Charcole MNK73/WAR36
Midget THF73/NIN36
Elboron BRD67/WHM33
Grymalkyn THF67/NIN33
Tsakiki PLD67/WAR33
Wendell WHM65/BLM32
Muirnin THF66/NIN33
Kitti THF66/NIN33
Akuma BLM66/WHM33
Vyce SAM62/WAR31

Kiki asked for a Sneak, and headed over to the Cracked Wall in the ruins, and examined it. Suddenly, two Cardians appeared, the Queen of Coins (RDM) and the Queen of Swords (PLD). Grym pulled the Queen of Swords, and we all attacked. With two tanks and four thieves, as well as our other damage dealers, the fight was over quickly, and we pulled the Queen of Coins. This fight was a bit tougher (Kiki got hit for close to 800 damage with a Fire IV), but again, it was over quickly and we all ran over to the Cracked Wall for a cutscene, and got the Orastery Ring from Semih.

The rest of the mission involved a lot of footwork, running from Apururu to Shantotto, back to Apururu, then into the ruins through the Three Mage Gate to the Gate of Darkness. We rescued Ajido-Marujido, and headed back to Windurst for more cutscenes, and get Rank 9 (as well as 80,000 gil, which most people probably used to buy crystals to get the next mission - the city giveth and the city taketh away).

Quests: The Lost Cardian/The Kind Cardian

The other day, Splinte needed someone with the title "Bringer of Bliss" for the fortune teller/food quest. This comes from the Kind Cardian quest, which I had forgotten was available after completing Cook's Pride, which both Grym and Kiki had completed some time ago. Kiki headed to Jeuno to start this quest to help out Splinte, and learned it was actually two quests.

First she headed to the Merchant's House with Panta-Putta's family, and learned that they were concerned that their Cardian servant, the Two of Swords was missing. Kiki asked around, and ended up talking to the doctor in the Infirmary in Upper Jeuno. The Two of Swords was there, and the doctor asked if Kiki could take him to the Manustery for repairs. They were concerned that repairing the Cardian would make him lose his memory, but Panta-Putta wanted his friend back, so Kiki agreed. This completed The Lost Cardian, and gave Kiki the new title "Two's Company", and started The Kind Cardian quest.

Splinte knew that Apururu would ask Kiki for a Ten of Cups card, and send one for her to use. Kiki headed to the Manustery in Windurst Woods, but Apururu was blindly focused on Kiki's current mission, and just kept telling her to gather the five rings and take them to Shantotto, completely ignoring the fact that Kiki had the Two of Swords with her. Grymalkyn hadn't yet picked up the next mission, so she jumped in to help Splinte, and did the Lost Cardian and headed to Windurst. Apururu said she could help restore the Two of Swords, but would need a Ten of Cups card (just as Splinte had predicted), so Grymalkyn got the card from Kiki and gave it to Apururu, and returned to Panta-Putta in Jeuno to completed the quest and reunite the Cardian with the family.

After Kiki completes her current mission, she and Grymalkyn will head to the Hurototo Ruins to collect a couple of cards from the Ten of Cups and Kiki will complete the quest as well.

New Titles: Two's Company, Bringer of Bliss

Quests: Escort for Hire (Bastok)

Having recently spent some time in Crawlers Nest helping with coffer key hunts, and seeing that everything was easy prey or lower, we decided it was finally time to try the Escort for Hire (Bastok) quest, and see if we could safely get Olavia to her destination. With the reward being a page from Miratete's Memoirs, and the possibility of 1000 to 2000 experience points, this would be one way to help us try to catch up to Itera (as long as we make him read the pages on any job besides his monk).

We agreed to try it on Monday night, but Itera couldn't pick up the quest Sunday night. He had the San d'Orian escort quest active, and headed back to San d'Oria to cancel it, but when he returned to Bastok, he still couldn't get the quest. Apparently it was a fame issue, so he took some time on Monday to take stacks and stacks of La Thiene Cabbage to Selbina. It wasn't quite enough, and rather the put off the quest, we went ahead with him helping for no reward.

We met at the entrance to Crawlers Nest, Kiki PLD67/WAR33, Itera MNK67/WAR33, Grym THF66/BST33, Elbo BRD66/WHM33. We put Elboron in charge of controlling Olavia (you can get her to start and stop by talking to her), and headed in. Olavia was happy to see her escort crew, and took off running. From the ball room, she headed northwest, into a room I'd never been in, where there were 4 Doom Scorpions. Grym charmed one into being her pet, and we killed the others. Olavia then headed back out, and headed down to the "racetrack" room, and through the area where we normally fight helm beetles for coffer keys. We had to kill crawlers, scorpions, and beetles along the way, but it went smoothly, and we had plenty of time. Grym's thought behind subbing BST and charming a monster was to have it take care of some of the monsters we'd run into and we wouldn't have to fight ourselves, but we ended up just fighting and killing everything anyway.

Olavia came to a stop in a room at the end of the helm beetle tunnel, and thanked us for her help. She gave us a completion certificate for our assistance, and vanished. We were wondering if we just had to leave her to die there with the crawlers and scorpions, but apparently she had a safe way out.

Instead of leaving Crawlers Nest right away, we decided to stay for some weapon skillups. Grym and Elboron both ended up leveling to 67 on the same easy prey kill, which was a bit of a surprise. We had no idea they were within 20 points of each other. Kiki got to 200 on her staff - only 15 more to Spirit Taker!

When it was time to think about turning in for the night, Elboron and Kiki headed back to Bastok to get their reward (Grym had an errand to run and didn't join us). The first time you complete the quest, you get 10,000 gil in addition to the experience scroll, but it's definitely worth doing just for the scroll. We can repeat the quest every week, and I think we would all like that. It was a lot of fun! Kiki ended up getting 1404 exp from her scroll, which puts her at 5.5k into level 67.

Missions: Vain (Windurst Mission 8-1)

We scheduled to fight the NM for Mission 8-1 this Saturday evening, so after completing Mission 7-2 last week, Elboron, Grymalkyn, and Kiki donated crystals to help the Windurst conquest, and the gate guard offered the mission Vain to them. We were sent to talk to Moreno-Toeno at the Aurastery, who wanted us to find another missing minister, Sedal-Godjal. To help us find him, we were given a magic doll, the Star Seeker, which was drawn to the power of a ring carried by Sedal-Godjal.

Every time we entered a new zone, the doll would jump in our hands and tell us to head in a specific direction. This led us to the Qu'Hau Spring in Ro'Maeve, where we didn't find Sedal-Godjal, but saw a very mysterious figure. Since this was our first time really in Ro'Maeve, we took the opportunity to run into the Hall of the Gods and take a look around.

On Saturday night, we had a huge group, with 5 helpers, and 11 of us on the mission.

helpers:
Trow RDM75/DRK37
Daden WAR75/NIN37
Yobun PLD73/WAR36
Erock WAR72/NIN36
Vynala PLD65/WAR32

mission participants:
Charcole MNK73/WAR36
Midget THF72/NIN36
Izan DRG72/WAR36
Diasuke SMN72/WHM36
Tsakiki PLD67/WAR33
Grymalkyn THF66/NIN33
Elboron BRD66/WHM33
Akuma BLM65/WHM32
Wendell WHM65/BLM32
Ryrra MNK65/WAR32
Muirnin THF64/NIN32

With this many people, we just fought our way through Monastic Cavern and back into the center part of Davoi. We cleaned up all of the Orcs around the house, and got ready for our first go-round with the NM we would have to kill 6 times to get the eleven items we needed for the people on the mission. Yobun entered the house, and wasn't able to pull the orcs in the house individually, so the battle was on. We had 4 or 5 orcs all over us, with the NM, Dirtyhanded Gochakzuk hitting us all with Blizzaga III right at the start. It looked bad for a few moments, but we got everything under control and won the battle with no losses on our side. We then headed into the house to wait for the NM to return (15-30 minute respawn time).

The NM was on a different spawn cycle than his attendant Orcs, so we usually didn't have to take them all on at once after the first time. Yobun and Ryrra were having network troubles, disconnected, reconnected, disconnected again, and couldn't get back. They ended up having Wendell log in as them to get Ryrra's Cursed Wand and get them both sent to their homepoints with a Warp II. This meant we lost our main tank after the first fight, but we had plenty of tanks in the group, and managed well enough. The fights were all over quickly, so most of our time was spent waiting for the respawns, the Tarutaru doing dances to help speed things up. We did manage to stop the rain once, but didn't seem to coax Dirtyhanded Gochakzuk out quicker.

When we'd killed the NM 6 times and all of us had our Cursed Wands, our helpers and a few of the people on the mission headed off to their homes, leaving a smaller group of us to make our way over to Sedal-Godjal on the platform above the pond in the first section in Davoi. He took our wands and explained why he was in hiding. Next, we headed back to Windurst to report back to Moreno-Toeno and completed our mission.