Dynamis: Bastok Farming Again

SnakesOnADynamis headed back to Bastok again on Tuesday, since another group was planning on a San d'Oria run. We ended up with 22 people for the run, with several new members showing up. It was a good mix of jobs, and seemed a bit more balanced than our run on Saturday, with more BLMs and damage dealers, and only two PLDs and one NIN this time. Our main tank Takoom couldn't make it, and I was nominated main tank. This scared me a bit, but it wasn't really so bad. After all, I love tanking, and find my role as backup tank confusing (do I try to build some hate with provoke and flash? do I just fight and help heal people? should I be flashing/provoking slept mobs?). Being main tank is much more straightforward. I just have to learn which mobs should be fought first and be quick to get the next one when the one we're fighting is dead.

We started out very well, and the drops were drastically better than they had been on Saturday. It was Lightsday, Full Moon, and we had two THFs in the group. I'm sure all of those made a difference. We had three sponsors for the run, and I believe we got over 70 currency drops for them, as opposed to the 27 we got the last time. We also got an Assassin's Vest, Wyrm Brais, Abyss Sollerets, and a Valor Coronet. We had 3 PLD main lotters, and one of them (Tiah, attending as WHM) already has the coronet, so it was between me and Raycmd. I won the lot, and now have a shiny new coronet to wear. I wish Kiki's bangs didn't cover it up.

We were making good progress, and got quite a few time extensions. We had a lot of deaths on the waves of BSTs with the scorpions, but it wasn't a full wipe like it had been the last time. Things pretty much fell apart when we got to the first trigger mob for the boss. We weren't really prepared for it, and a lot of us didn't know what we were supposed to do. So we ended up with it being just another farming run. We're only going to improve over time though, and I have hope for future runs. I ended up dying 4 times over the course of the night, losing around 2.5k exp with my RR2s from my Reraise Gorget. I still have over 9k in my buffer, but I will start reading scrolls on PLD to help keep my level.