Leveling: Dvucca Isle Staging Point (75)

Grym has left the Low Level Static, still not yet level 75, but having got Kiki there. He was just too fed up with leveling THF to keep going any further. We've asked Charcole (MNK73) to join us, since the High Level Static that he had been in broke up before Charcole got past 73. So now we have MNK, MNK, PLD, BRD, WHM and Yobun, normally THF, but could be BLM, PLD or even BRD at this point.

We decided to go try fighting the Lamia Idolators (Qutrubs) and Heraldic Imps and Jnuns in Caedarva Mire, just outside the Dvucca Isle Staging Point. The area was devoid of other parties, so it seemed pretty promising. However, for some reason we opted to not do a skillchain and just free weaponskill, and the Qutrubs took awhile to kill (even though we'd seen a screenshot of over 7K damage from a Light Skillchain on these things). We were still getting Chain #5s, but it just wasn't as fast as the week before.

Yobun started out as THF, but went back to town to change to BLM. While Yobun was in Al Zahbi, we got aggro'd by a Lamia Idolator when Wendell was AFK. Itera used Hundred Fists on it, pulled hate, and the Lamia Idolator promptly cast Sleepga, putting the rest of us to sleep. Itera died, but then we all woke up and managed to kill the qutrub.

Even when Yobun was using SATA on me, I really couldn't hold hate at all. It was really frustrting, but with Itera and Charcole throwing out over 2000 damage with Asuran Fists, it was just impossible. After Yobun switched to BLM, Elboron started pulling.

I had decided to do some experimenting with gear and food, to try to increase my damage output (and seeing as I hadn't been taking much damage lately from these tough and very tough mobs we've been fighting, I could forego a bit of VIT and DEF). I started out the night with my Byrnie, Walkure's Mask, Psilos Mantle, Lifebelt, Jaegar Ring, Ruby Ring, Feral Trousers, Spike Earring, and Minuet Earring (some of this borrowed from Grym), and ate a Coeurl Sub for even more +attack and +str. I had a bit of accuracy trouble, so I switched to Bream Sushi after half an hour. I wasn't hitting as hard anymore, so next time I used Sole Sushi.

I gave up on the attack gear though, since I just couldn't hold hate at all, and put all of my +Enmity gear back on. That still didn't really help very much. But I do think that I'm better off eating Sole Sushi now rather than Tavnazian Tacos, for the +STR and +ACC. Maybe I need to use a High Breath Mantle and look into even more +Enmity, but I'm afraid if the MNKs are using Asuran Fists right after I provoke, all hope of me actually tanking is lost.

Yobun was parsing the fights, and I get discouraged with my minimal percentage of damage (13%), but since half the time I'm actually casting cures on the monks, it's not really a fair assesment. I do like seeing my Swift Blades for over 800 points every once in awhile though! I'll have to see what I can do with Vorpal Blade if I'm eating sushi.

It was an incredibly frustrating leveling session. I'm not a good DD (compared to the MNKs anyway), especially if I'm busy dumping Cure IVs on a couple of MP sponges, and if I can't improve the efficiency of the party by minimizing the damage taken from the mobs (by having them hit me instead of the squishier Monks), there really doesn't seem to be much point to me being there.

We ended up with a nearly complete wipe at the end of our session, with 3 of the qutrubs on us at the same time. I think we could have done better here than we did, but we'll probably never go back, so it doesn't much matter what I think. I ended up just short of 11,000 limit points for the evening, using my Empress Band. Now that I have my first Merit Point, I have to figure out my plan for Merits.