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.