Dynamis: The Northlands

Since I've fallen behind on my posting, here's another update-type entry for Dynamis. After our St. Patrick's Day failure in Dynamis-Beaucedine, we headed back again the following Wednesday. There was another shell that doesn't use the Rusty Buckets calendar that was hoping to get the zone before us (and this LS is notorious for "stealing" zones from others), but we got everyone there early, so we would be ready to go in as soon as WeMeleeStatues finished up their run. We worked with WMS to know exactly when they were exiting, and Venn was able to trade the Timeless Hourglass before the other LS's leader. Hurray! Many thanks to Ayvaen and Akuma and Verence for their cooperation. This run went much better than the previous one, and we even got WHM and RDM relic, as well as 2 100s. We had a fairly uneventful run to Fei'Yin, made a clean pull on the Mega Boss, and won the flag for 6 more members of TheUltimates.

I'm pretty sure I was main tank for this run, but I can't really remember. We've since switched to having the would-be main tanks all /random at the start of the run, with the top lotter being the main tank and the second lotter being back-up. I think it makes for a strong tanking force to have us all sharing main tanking duties, rather than designating a single person. Plus it splits up the responsibility and keeps one person from getting burnt out, or worse, not being there one night and having no one else used to it.

On Saturday evening, we headed back to Dynamis-Xarcabard, for our re-match with the Dynamis Lord. Leroi won main tanking duties, while I was on backup. We had a really good run, with no wipes, and no mass links like we had my first time there. We even got RNG, SAM, and NIN relic drops, but of course we ended up with controversy over the lotting, which has caused a great deal of turmoil in the LS this week.

Since it was pretty much the same sort of drama as our last run in Xarcabard, Venn is trying to come up with a way so long-time members don't feel cheated out of "their" relic. No one seems to want a points system, but the original rules don't seem to work either. As much as people espouse the notion of being one big happy family and being glad the LS got the drops even if they don't get it themselves, when it comes right down to losing the lot on something you want, emotions take over. This stress is on the verge of tearing apart the linkshell, with some people threatening to leave if we switch to points, and other threatening to leave if we don't. Right now the idea of a "dream item list", stolen from the LegacyOfOld linkshell seems to be popular, but I don't think that will please everyone either.

The Dynamis Lord himself spanked us again. We had him down to about 25%, but Oblivion Smash smashed us into oblivion, and it was all over. With my new Bomb Queen Ring, I ended up with 1675 HP for my initial Spirits Within on the Dynamis Lord. That was kind of fun, but I need to work on a macro palette to use just for the DL fight. The one I made on Saturday just isn't doing it for me yet.

This Wednesday (March 28th), we had a very fun farming run in Dynamis-Beaucedine. We got further into the Hydra Corps than we had on previous farming runs, and even got 4 relic pieces to drop: WHM for Meshe, BLM for Luiss, THF for Lucrezia, and DRG for Kojita. That completed Kojita's relic set, so he was pretty happy. Actually, I think everyone was pretty excited about the drops. We also got one 100 piece for the Treasury. Daden won the /random for main tank, with Lumikumi I think on backup, so I tried my best to keep statues and slept mobs pre-occupied with me rather than smacking on the pullers or the sleepers.

It's off to Dynamis-Buburimu on Saturday, and I've very excited to see what that's like!

Quests: Operation Desert Swarm, Melee Style (KSNM30)

On Sunday, Corbun wanted to do a round of Operation Desert Swarm, melee style. We ended up with Corbun (SAM/NIN), Yobun (WHM/SMN), Daden (NIN/WAR), Lucrezia (THF/NIN), Jaerik (SAM/NIN), and Tsakiki (PLD/NIN). I've been on a few manaburn runs, with Black Mages for hire, but on those I would merely stand back and watch the spectacle. For the melee style, the plan is to have a NIN tank 2 of the Platoon Scorpions, with 4 melee with NIN subbed each taking care of one of their own, and a WHM on hand for cures, buffs, and status removal.

We each picked up a Lachesis Orb in Port Jeuno, trading 30 Kindred Seals for it, then headed up to the Waughroon Shrine in Palborough Mines. The fights all went very smoothly, and were quite a lot of fun. We were each assigned a particular Platoon Scorpion (or two in Daden's case). We ran up to the edge of the arena, targetted our assigned foe, drew our weapons, and Corbun used his bow and arrow to pull them all to us. We each grabbed our Scorpion and fanned out over the arena to avoid each others' Scorpions' AOE attacks. Daden pulled his two into the entrance. We each worked on killing our own, then jumping in to defeat the others. Lucrezia usually finished hers first, then ran over to assist me, while Corbun and Jaerik would finish theirs and go help Daden. When Luc and I finished mine, we'd help get the last blows in on Daden's second scorpion. Meanwhile, Yobun would run around casting spells on people as they needed them.

It was really quite an easy way to do this KSNM, and I don't know why it has a reputation of being hard to do without manaburning it. Of course, it took us 5-6 minutes for each run, compared to under 2 minutes for a burn, but still, it's not like it's really time-consuming. Unfortunately, despite the full moon, we got terrible treasure. I think the total for all 6 runs was under 300k - not exactly a good payoff for the 180 Kindred Seals.

Quests: Under Observation (BCNM40)

Daden wanted to do some runs of Under Observation, a three-man BCNM40 that can drop the Peacock Charm. For this BCNM, you have 15 minutes to defeat three Hecteyes: Sobbing Eyes and his two smaller companions, the Compound Eyes. We had 4 people wanting to do it, so we did 4 runs, with Daden's NIN/BLM and Lucrezia's NIN/WAR going on all 4 runs, while I went on two runs as BST/RDM, and Yobun as BST/WHM went on the other two runs.

The strategy we used was to have the BST pull the Sobbing Eyes using a jug pet, and then kite it up and down the long entrance path, while the two NINs would each take a Compound Eye and solo them. After the NINs defeated their eyes, the BST would bring the Sobbing Eyes back up to the arena, and everyone would fight. Since the Hex Eye attack from the Hecteyes doesn't work if you're turned away, NINs using the Ninjitsu elemental wheel do a great job in this fight - they face away and just cast their spells, killing the eyes fairly quickly, and damage minimized by their shadows.

Our first run was a failure. I used a Courier Carrie for my pet - theory being it could take more damage, but it got bound or petrified at the beginning of the fight, so it didn't move out of the area right away. Daden also got paralyzed at the start, and ended up dying while we fought the Sobbing Eyes.

Yobun went on the second run, which was a success and we got a scroll of Utsusemi Ni. For the third run, I used a Tiger Familiar. That worked a lot better for kiting, as the kitties run so very fast. I sent my tiger in to fight the Sobbing Eyes, ran out of the arena, used Heel, then headed to the bottom of the ramp, where I told the tiger to stay. Then back up the ramp, heel/stay, down the ramp, heel/stay, and then the NINs were ready for the Sobbing Eyes. Another success, but nothing good dropped. The final run also dropped Utsusemi Ni, so we had a decent payoff for the four runs, and it was a lot of fun as well!

Notorious Monsters: Bomb Queen

Last Saturday, a bunch of TheUltimates assembled in Ifrit's Cauldron, hoping to get five Bomb Queen Rings. This ring, which has +75HP on it, is a 100% drop from the Bomb Queen, which is spawned by trading three Bomb Queen Ashes and one Bomb Queen Core to a ??? spot in Ifrit's Cauldron. Armageddon, Tsakiki, Jarbit and Kojita all had pop items, and Lumikumi managed to get them as well before we finished the run (Jarbit had extra Bomb Queen Cores).

We had quite a few helpers, some of whom were hoping we might get Avengers to drop. Meshe, Goto, Frostwitch, Pokeil, Itera, Darsonavin, Lucrezia, Luiss, and Theodoric all helped us out. Lucrezia was there as her BST75, and used the local fauna as pets. The fights went very well. The Bomb Queen keeps generating "babies": Bomb Prince, Bomb Princess, and Bomb Bastard (we didn't see any of the Bomb Bastards). We had the BLMs ready to nuke the Bomb Princes, while the Bomb Princesses were taken care of by the melee. I was the nominal tank for the fights, but Itera usually ended up doing most of the tanking.

The Bomb Queen has about 50,000 HP, so the fights took a bit of time, but Lucrezia kept an eye out for Volcanic Gas spawns to send a pet after, and we all whitled away on the Bomb Queen. We only had a couple of deaths from Self Destruct I believe - Goto and Darsonavin were the victims if I remember correctly. It was a fun series of fights, and we now have 5 happy owners of Bomb Queen Rings. We didn't get any of the Avengers, which has led us to speculate that they're somehow tied to the Bomb Bastard.

It's nice to have finally added the ring to my collection of things to give me more HP!

Limbus: Apollyon Farming

After our series of Temenos runs to get the chips for Ultima, TheNewUltimates headed back to Apollyon for a couple of runs. This has had the side benefit of us starting to gather a second set of chips for Omega as well.

Last Thursday, we headed to Apollyon NW (the Kings), with a group of 12 people: Venn, Kojita, Itera, Ezekiel, Lucrezia, Thom, Ardan, Meshe, Neborin, Tsakiki, Sarntur, and Serenity. We cleared the zone, getting items for SAM (Ezekiel), BRD (Serenity), PLD (Kojita), PLD (Thom), SAM, NIN, WHM, and a Magenta Chip. We ended up with 57 coins as well. Our fight with Kaiser Behemoth was very exciting, and it was a last-second sprint for the final treasure chest to get it opened before we were booted from the arena.

On Sunday, we headed to Apollyon SE (ghosts, crabs, skeletons, weapons). We had to wait a bit for Neborin to show up, so we did some organ farming in Sea while we waited. At one point, we decided to take on a UFO, since we had 11 people there, and we just might be able to pull it off. It was pretty fun, but we ended up with a half-wipe and the other people managed to get back out to the crag to save themselves. The UFOs are pretty annoying - they strip all of your gear off, and they charm you as well. A bad combination of the Merrow and Lamiae abilities. It was very funny to watch the charmed people take off after the uncharmed ones, but I don't think we'll be trying that again soon.

This was Daden's first time in Limbus with us, and we ended up with 12 people: Venn, Kojita, Itera, Ezekiel, Thunderbolt, Daden, Morgoth, Meshe, Neborin, Ardan, Thom, and Tsakiki. We had a bit of trouble when we had 3 of the skeletons on us at once, but in general, the run was pretty smooth, and we cleared the zone, getting 44 coins in the process. We also got items for upgrades for THF (Neborin), DRK, MNK (Itera), DRG (Venn), and WAR (Daden), as well as a Smalt Chip for our second Omega set.

If all of us show up for tonight's run, we might try Omega, or one of the Metal Chip levels. It should be exciting!

Missions: Shades of Vengence (ToAU 31)

A week ago, having defeated the Lancelord Gaheel Ja, a bunch of ClanBEB set out to try to rescue Aphmau and her puppets. We were sent to Periqia at the Dvucca Isle Staging Point, and found ourselves facing a horde of K23H1-LAMIAE. I was with Diasuke (SMN75), Demin (MNK75), Yobun (BLM75), Lucrezia (NIN75), and Ranzz (BRD75). The fight didn't go as well as expected, and we were defeated. Lesson learned - don't stand within blood aggro range of a bunch of Lamiae when you've used Carbuncle to pull one.

The Lamiae have a terrible poison that they inflict that does 80 hp damage per tick, and I tried using poison potions to counteract it, but either it wore off or the Lamia poison over-wrote it. We all had antidotes on us as well, and made heavy use of them. Our second round went a bit better, and we got three of them killed and after another surprising cutscene, completed the mission. Again, I'll not spoil the story here, but I do need to go back and rewatch some of the previous mission cutscenes to see if I can see clues to a twist in the plot. I think they're there, but I want to see them again.

New title: Nashmeira's Mercenary

Dynamis: Thar Be Dragons

TheUltimates has been busy getting newer members all the flags they need so we can have more people when we next face the Dynamis Lord in Xarcabard (this coming Saturday). On March 10th, we cleared Jeuno, getting 5 pieces of AF2 in the process. I was main tank for this run, and it looked like I was going to actually make it through without a single death. The Ranger NM mob knocked me down to 3 HP, but I must've lost hate after taking so much damage, because I seemed to hang there at 3 HP for many seconds before all the cures hit me and I was back to full. I did finally succumb to one of the final mobs before the Mega Boss (it was a MNK this time). Both Itera and Lumikumi (and at least one other person) had needed the flag to finally get Northlands access.

Then on the 14th, we headed to San d'Oria. It was the night of the Ninja pants - 4 dropped on the run, along with Monster Trousers (I'm now 3/5 on my BST relic), WHM, and RNG. The run wasn't as smooth as some - it's almost like we think San d'Oria's a walk in the park and get a bit careless - but it was fun, and we got 3 more members Northlands access. Lumikumi was main tank for this, with Armageddon as backup tank. This was our second run with the Taru Tank Trio, aka the Tonka Tanks. It's pretty cool being part of a Tarutaru PLD team. We go well with our legion of Elvaan Black Mages.

On Saturday, with quite a few people needing the Beaucedine flag, we headed to Dynamis-Beaucedine. Daden just returned to the game after a brief paternity leave, and asked to main tank in Beaucedine (as NIN75). We had too many tanks for the tank party, so I dropped and joined the "suicide squad", hoping to help Meshe keep them alive while I kited statues and provoked/flashed slept mobs. The run went very quickly, and as typical for the Glacier, we didn't get a single piece of AF2.

Things went horribly wrong with the Mega Boss pull though, and we ended up failing to get the flag. Daden lost the eye in the dragons and it got too far away from him for provoke, so Goldfish slowed down to let Daden get it, and got killed. So the dragons all came running back right away to slaughter us all. We learned that they have an enormous aggro range, and you simply cannot reraise anywhere closer than the top of the ramp down to Fei'Yin. No corner of the Fei'Yin "field" is safe.

No one has the zone scheduled for Wednesday, so instead of doing Dynamis-Valkurm as we'd planned, we're heading back to Beaucedine. We need everyone for Xarcabard on Saturday!

Quests: The Day of the Primes

Several people in TheUltimates were interested in various prime avatar fights, so we had a group that did all six of the "normal" ones on Saturday. We started out with Anrita (WHM75), Luiss (BLM75), Sabella (RDM64), and Tsakiki (PLD75). We're all Tarutaru, so it was a pretty cute group. I was worried about not having enough damage, but it was a needless worry. The four of us fought Titan, Garuda and Ramuh, then Meshe joined us for Leviathan with his WHM75. Goto, also WHM75, joined us for Ifrit and then Shiva. I think Meshe felt a bit tall with the 5 Tarutarus.

We had a fun time, and the fights were all without incident. The avatars' two-hours scarcely touched us, between the bar-element spell and having Rampart up for them, we nearly always completely resisted. On one of them Luiss took a good chunk of damage, and I think it was Anrita who got hit a bit on another, but overall, a very painless trip to all of the cloisters.

Limbus: Temenos Central, Third Floor

Our Limbus group is growing, and people are tending to show up all the time now. Last Sunday night, we had 15 people in the alliance: Venn, Kojita, Ezekiel, Itera, Lucrezia, Thunderbolt (BLU), Serenity (BLM), Sarntur, Morgoth (RDM), Neborin, Ardan, Thom, Meshe, Ranzz, and Tsakiki. We used the Ivory Chip from Temenos North, and did the third floor of Temenos Central, the last one we needed to complete our chip set for Proto Omega.

This zone, like the other two "second tier" Temenos areas, has a 45 minute time limit, with one item chest at the end. The monsters here consist of a Yagudo Summoner NM, a Quadav White Mage NM, and an Orcish Paladin NM. Each of them has 6 of their henchmen scattered throughout the zone, feeding them power. Our plan was to kill the 18 henchmen first, to weaken the NMs, as well as maximize our coin drops for the run. We pretty much tore through all of the beastmen mobs, more like I've seen in Dynamis fights than what we normally have done in Limbus. None of us were really ever in any danger.

We were a bit worried about the NMs, especially the SMN with its Astral Flow attack. We ended up having all three of them on us at once (carbuncle pull didn't work on them). The BLMs kept them asleep though, and we quickly demolished the Yagudo SMN. The Paladin Orc took us longer to kill, and then we turned to the Quadav WHM. His HP melted away, but then he used Benediction and we had to re-do all the damage we'd already done. I ended up getting killed by him, but it was near the end of the fight, and no one else died. We'd cleared the zone in less than 28 minutes, ending up with 46 coins total, an item for upgrading DRG AF, and the Silver chip. It was a fun run, and it was good it was quick, since we weren't allowed to get the cosmo-cleanse until after 10pm, what with the time change for Daylight Savings Time.

Quests: Sheep in Antlion's Clothing (Boneyard Gully ENM)

On Saturday evening, another linkshell entered Dynamis-Jeuno about 90 minutes before we were supposed to. This meant we'd be starting two hours late, and since people needed the flag for Northlands access, we really had no choice but to wait. While we were waiting, Kojita recruited Itera, Goto and I for an ENM with Hatushara. They wanted to do the Sheep in Antlion's Clothing in Boneyard Gully. It's uncapped, with a 6-man limit. It requires the Miasma Filter key item, which Itera and I had both picked up when we had done the Tor climb for CoP Mission 3-3 nearly a year ago.

For this ENM, you need to defeat Tuchulcha, an antlion that hides under the sand. You find her by running around the BC area, and getting ambushed by her. After you fight her a bit, she burrows into the sand again, and you have to run around to find her. She also has three companions that will jump out and fight you as well, so you pretty much have to be as quick as you can.

We ended up having to search for her four times total, and did find all three of her companions. We killed each of those, and we got Tuchulcha killed before the fifteen minutes ran out. We were rewarded with 2500 experience points (mostly wasted on me, since I was about 50 points away from being capped), and the treasure box contained both a Hagun and a Forager's Mantle! Itera sold them for us, and we each got 520k gil from it, which was an nice, unexpected, addition to Kiki's dwindling pocketbook.

We're going to see if we can do this, and maybe a couple other ENMs, on a regular basis. I'm not sure when I'll have time though.

Missions: Puppet in Peril (ToAU 29)

The new update last week included more missions in the Treasures of Aht Uhrghan storyline. Kiki went to talk to Naja, then headed to the Imperial Whitegate for an audience with the Grand Vizier. He asked Kiki to head to the Aydeewa Subterrane to look for clues in Aphmau's disappearance.

Kiki grabbed a chocobo and made her way to one of the lower rooms in Aydeewa Subterrane, where she found one of the Immortals, Rishfee. He suggested Kiki should head to Walahara Temple in Whitegate. There she found Gessho talking with Nadeey and learned that Aphmau had indeed sought sanctuary there in the temple. Aphmau asked Kiki for her help in rescuing Ovjang from Mamook.

Lucrezia (THF), Ranzz (BRD), and Goto (WHM) were on the same mission, and we banded together and headed to the Jade Sepulcher near the Mamool Ja Staging Point. We found ourselves in a battle with Lancelord Gaheel Ja, who was riding a huge Wivre, the likes of which we hadn't seen. It was a difficult fight, since Gaheel Ja kept curing himself for more than we could damage him, and he didn't have a normal hate mechanism, and would randomly go after any one of us. We ended up failing, with Goto dying twice and Kiki once. Ranzz and Luc were able to make it out of the BC alive.

Last night, Ranzz, Lucrezia, and Kiki returned to the Jade Sepulcer, with Lucrezia as NIN. Diasuke (RDM), Yobun (BLM), and Corbun (SAM) came along with us this time, and we were able to fairly easily defeat Gaheel Ja. Corbun died, reraised, and died again immediately, but he was the only fatality. Aphmau and her automatons are still in danger though, so we must go further afield to rescue them.

Limbus: Temenos Central, Second Floor

We did another one of the "second level" Temenos runs on Thursday night, this time the Second Floor of Temenos Central. This requires a Scarlet Chip from Temenos East for entry.

This area has 8 elementals, and a Mystic Avatar Carbuncle to fight. When you kill an elemental, the element weak to its element will become a mystic avatar for that element. For example, killing the fire elemental will cause the ice elemental to turn into Shiva. If you follow the elemental weakness chain, you can kill 5 elementals, 1 avatar, then the two Light Elementals that guard Carbuncle, and finally, Carbuncle himself.

We had the same 12 people on the run as we had on Sunday for the First Floor: Venn, Kojita, Itera, Ezekiel, Ranzz, Lucrezia, Thunderbolt, Thom, Ardan, Meshe, Neborin, and Tsakiki. Ezekiel led us around to the elements so that we fought them in this order: Water, Thunder, Earth, Air, Ice. The Fire Elemental then turned into Ifrit. We fought Ifrit on one of the tall ramps, with the melee down below and the mages above, to protect the mages from Astral Flow. We had Ranzz in the tank party, so I could get the appropriate carol to protect me from Astal Flow. I also bought some Pescatora to give me an HP boost along with some added defense. I ended up with about 1485 HP for the run.

Ifrit blasted us with Inferno, and poor Lucrezia was defeated. We defeated Ifrit, Meshe raised Lucrezia, and we moved on to the two Light Elementals. Ardan used Carbuncle to pull one of the elementals at a time, since they're grouped together with the Mystic Carbuncle. He got clean pulls on both, and we defeated them. It was time to face Carbuncle, but he wasn't so bad. We did get blasted pretty badly with Searing Light, but only Venn, Ezekiel, and myself were defeated. We immediately reraised and got right back into the fight. Even with my 490 HP in weakened state, Carbuncle wasn't too troublesome. I used Invincible after my first provoke when I got back up, and that helped keep the damage to a minimum, and Meshe kept me healthy after that wore off.

It was a fun run, and quick as well. We ended up with an item for BST AF+1, which Lucrezia won, a Cerulean Chip that will be needed for Proto Omega, and 41 coins to split amongst ourselves.

Dynamis: Update-type Thingy

I'm a bit behind on Dynamis entries (part of the Blog Boredom I mentioned awhile back), so here's an update type of post.

February 24th, we had our first San d'Oria run since I joined TheUltimates. No one needed the flag, so it was just a farming run, and I got to see more of Dynamis-San d'Oria than I had with Snakes - we headed past the east gate and through the streets and ended up in one of the courtyard off in the northwest part of town. Lumikumi was main tank, with me as the backup. We didn't get any AF2 to drop until we were past the east gate, but then it started raining pants. We ended up with 4 pairs of MNK shorts, 2 pairs of RNG shorts, and 1 pair of NIN whatevers. The Monks were all pretty happy - I believe this was the first time TheUltimates had ever had the Melee Hose drop.

February 28th, we had a farming run in Beaucedine Glacier. I was main tank, with Mayze as backup. I seemed to die a lot more than normal, usually from an Eagle Eye Shot from one of the RNG mobs. Someone commented that maybe I needed more +HP gear, but since I'd lose enmity in each slot that I'd equip more HP, I don't think that's really the answer. It's more of a case of "keep the tank's HP over 1000 until the RNG uses EES". My standard dynamis tanking HP is 1308 with a taco and a high breath mantle. I can get another 187 HP from my gear, but at the expense of 15 Enmity and 15 Shield Skill less than my standard gear. We got more AF2 than we'd expect from a Northlands run: MNK, WHM, and BST. Rassitier was the lucky MNK, Reefermadness the lucky WHM, and I was the only one lotting on the Monster Gaiters when it dropped to "BST50+ may lot". I've put it on one of my mannequins along with my Monster Jackcoat.

On March 3rd, we made a flag run in Windurst for Fiftycent. We had a smaller crew than usual, with around 30 people at the start. I was the only "normal" PLD to show up at first, so Thom came as PLD too. Leroi eventually popped in, but could only stay for about an hour. I was main tank, with Leroi, then Thom as backup. Goto vowed to keep Kiki alive on this run, and it worked really well until I screwed up the fourth trigger pull. Thom and I ended up dead, and people had to fight a few linked Yagudos that they shouldn't have had to fight. It turned out OK, and we killed the mega boss without too much trouble. The drops were bad, with little currency, and just WHM (Albany) and RNG (Fiftycent) dropping. A lot of people left after the mega boss was down, and our farming didn't go terribly well afterwards.

Over March and April we're going to be focusing mostly on Northlands and CoP dynamis areas, so it should be pretty fun.

Crafting: Pamama au Lait and Sole Sushi

Over the past few weeks, I've been working on Qiara's cooking skill, getting her up to 82.6 from 77. I first made some Shallops Tropicale, since she had all the ingredients on hand, and it seems to be selling pretty well these days - decent profit even if you buy the ingredients on the AH. I then switched to Pamama au Lait, making enough to regen an army, but it's so cheap to make, and sells steadily for a profit, so it's not so bad, even as an unstackable item. It was especially handy when Windurst had control of Upper Elshimo, and Qiara could get the Pamamas herself. When she hit 78, I made a Whitefish Stew and turned it into the Guild to pass the test and become an Adept.

Since I knew Sole Sushi would be coming up quickly, I've started having Kiki fish for Black Sole in Port Jeuno. They're a lot easier to catch now than when I tried 30 levels ago, but if I'm not paying enough attention, I still time-out on them occasionally. I seem to get fewer skillups on the level 96 Black Sole (my fishing is at 69) than on the level 75 Kayabaligi, which feeds into my theory about skillups being better when you're close to the cap for a particular fish.

At current prices, it's still better for Qiara to make sushi out of the sole I catch, netting me about 25K for each stack of black sole I catch (two stacks of sole sushi), compared to 15-17K for the stack of sole itself. It's not too profitable to be making sushi if you have to buy your own fish though. I guess some of the anti-RMT measures have been working, since sole was much cheaper not that long ago. Tarutaru Rice isn't so costly on the AH anymore either - it's just a tiny bit more than it costs to buy from the Cooking Guild. I still should be growing my own though, since it's an easy crop to raise.

I had tried going to Oldton Movalpolis to catch Armored Pisces, which I could use for skilling up Bonecraft, but I can scarcely catch those any more. They must have changed how they fight, since I was able to catch them well enough ages ago.

I also entered the Fish Ranking Contest last month - they wanted the biggest Monke-Onke. I caught quite a few of them, and had one that was significantly bigger than the others. I turned that one in, and didn't try for another. However, I came in 24th, so it wasn't good enough.

Limbus: Temenos Central, First Floor

Ezekiel chose the First Floor of Temenos Central for our Limbus run on Sunday. This is a "second level" Temenos area, and requires an Emerald Chip from Temenos West. For this area, there are 6 mobs on one floor, with a 45 minute time limit, and only one item chest, which appears when you've defeated all 6 monsters. The monsters are paired, similar to the two dragons in Double Dragonian, or Ying and Yang with the Dynamis Lord: the second one gets much stronger when the first one is defeated. Our plan was to fight the first of the pair, getting it down to less than 10% health, then disengaging and sleeping it. The second of the pair would be pulled and killed, then we'd finish off the now-stronger first mob.

We had twelve people show up: Venn, Kojita, Itera, Ezekiel, Ranzz, Lucrezia, Neborin, Thom, Meshe, Thunderbolt (RDM), Ardan, and Tsakiki. First up was the Ahriman/Dragon pair. We pulled the Ahriman first. I think it was Ezekiel who said "watch out for Level 5 Petrify", about two seconds before the Ahriman used it and petrified us all. It didn't last long though, and we got the Ahriman down to minimal HP, and pulled the Dragon. The Dragon was a pain, as they typically are - dispelling food, buffs, reraise, and so forth. We got him dead and turned back to the Ahriman. It ended up killing me and then Ezekiel, but it was close to dead, and there were no other casualties. One thing we noticed is that there was a strong regen on the mobs that we slept, so even if we got them down to a sliver before sleeping them, they'd be back up between 25% and 50% when we got the other one of the pair killed and turned back to them.

After my weakness wore, we pulled the Evil Weapon, and repeated the process with its skeleton partner. The Evil Weapon killed me when we were finishing it off, but no one else. While we were waiting for my second weakness to wear, we got the 20 minute warning, so we knew we had plenty of time. The final pair of mobs were a Pot and a Ghost. The Pot seemed to go down really fast, but when we returned to it after sleeping it and killing the Ghost, it was a bit tougher. I think it was the Pot that had an AOE that nearly wiped out the mages, but no one died, and we won the level.

We ended up with 45 coins for the run, an Ecarlate Cloth (for WAR AF+1) that no one wanted, and an Orchid Chip, which will be needed for our Proto Omega fight. It seemed like a pretty easy run for a "second level" Limbus area, but when we have a full crew of 12, we do have a good team. When we were lotting on the 9 "extra" coins, Venn rolled a 0. I think I'd seen a 0 before on a /random, but only when people were goofing around, never actually lotting on something. Venn, Kojita and I were the unlucky lotters and got 3 coins, while the others got 4.

Leveling: Nyzul Isle (75)

On Saturday morning I decided I needed to work on getting my exp back to capped, and get some limit points on top of that, so I got everything I'd need for PLD/WAR, PLD/NIN or PLD/RDM, put up my flag, and fished Black Sole in Port Jeuno while I waited, and waited, and waited some more, for an invite. One finally came, from a BLU74 trying to put together a party. I canvassed BEB, and Goto was eager to join in, and once we had our tank and main healer, the other three were easy to add. We started out with a WAR/NIN, MNK/NIN, and RDM/BLM in addition to our BLU/NIN, WHM/BLM, and PLD/WAR. We first headed to the Mamool Ja Staging Point, but there were 3 or 4 parties there, so we headed to Nyzul Isle instead.

We headed out to Bhaflau Thickets, and fought on the second level, mostly Greater Colibri, with an occasional Bugard. I really think SquareEnix needs to add more "snack" foods to the game, if they're going to have mobs that snatch food away from you. I refuse to waste stacks of Tavnazian Tacos or Dorado Sushi, just to have it last until the bird gets TP. I actually prefered fighting the Bugards, since I didn't have to worry about Flash getting reflected, and I could hold hate on them much better. After I decided Flash wasn't so bad, since it would mostly be hitting me instead of one of the DDs, hate wasn't quite so bad on the birds either.

Over time, we morphed into a party with a different WAR, a different MNK, a SAM instead of the BLU, and a BRD instead of the RDM. I've decided that a BRD in an exp party is the bane of my tanking life. Once the BRD arrived and started singing the wonderful songs melees so love, I just couldn't hold hate any more. I was quite astonished at the difference, but it does really make sense. Too bad the only +enmity song they have is a merit ability, and just doesn't outweigh the extra damage the party puts out with march and minuet (or whatever it is the BRDs are singing). When I left the party, I replaced myself with Aphex, a NIN from TheUltimates, and they probably had a better time as a burn party at that point. I capped my exp, and have 2 merit points waiting for me to spend now.

Assaults: Haphazard Progress

I haven't been doing many assaults, other than a small flurry when Salvage was added and we had a few ClanBEB runs, helping some people start moving up in assault ranks. Last night I was visiting Jarbit and Frostwitch in TimeOut and they invited me to join them and Reefermadness on three runs of Golden Salvage. I'd only done this assault once before, and was aware of the way Summoners could easily avoid Mimic aggro and get the correct chest, but had only vaguely heard about how people could identify Mimics. Apparently if you're close enough to get the message "You have to move closer to the chest to open it", your cursor will stay on the chest if it's a mimic, but will lose focus if it's the treasure chest.

I'm sure SE will come up with a way to get rid of this easy way to win the mission, but in the meantime, it sure does make it easy. Frostwitch and Jarbit had to sleep a couple of the pugils on the three runs, and Reefermadness learned the hard way that mimics aggro if you get too close to them, but I kept the Mimic busy while Reefer ran off and found the right chest and Jarbit or Frostwitch hit the Rune of Release before I was dead. We quickly finished up our three runs, adding about 3000 points to my Ilrusi Atoll total.

I went to talk with Naja's slave boy afterwards to see if I'm ready to rank up to Lance Corporal, but I'm still a bit short still. Since I've only done one of the Superior Private assaults (Saving Private Ryaaf 6 times), it's taking a lot of repeats to get enough points for ranking up. I haven't been keeping track about how many I've done either, so I don't know how many more I have to go.

Limbus: Apollyon NW and Temenos N

We skipped Limbus last night, since we only had 7 people show up, and were a bit light on the mages. It will be nice when more of TheUltimates get Sea access and we can have more people for Limbus.

Last Thursday, we headed to Apollyon NW for farming, and ended up with 4 coins each for the 11 of us (Venn, Kojita, Lucrezia, Itera, Thunderbolt, Thom, Meshe, Sarntur, Neborin, Ranzz, and Tsakiki). We skipped the turtle, but decided to fight the wyrm, since it wasn't so bad the previous time. It was really weird though - we seemed to be scarcely denting it, though the only person we were missing was Ezekiel. Meshe theorized that the wyrm is stronger if you haven't killed the turtle on the previous level. We had a bunch of deaths, and finally gave up on it and moved up to the Behemoth level.

On Sunday, we tried farming in Temenos North, with just 8 of us (Venn, Kojita, Itera, Lucrezia, Ardan (SMN), Thom (SMN), Neborin, Tsakiki). This didn't go as well as we would have liked. We took the time chest on the first level and the items chests on the next two levels. Itera got his first AF upgrade item, so he was happy. We ended up with 18 coins total for the run, and timed out on the 4th floor.