The One Where Kiki Stopped Going to Limbus

It's been quite awhile since my last Limbus update, and it's even been over three months since my last Limbus run with TheNewUltimates. Overall, things were pretty routine through my last 4 months in Limbus. We'd collect chip sets and fight Omega and Ultima when we were ready, and consistently won. We even had death-free Omegas! Lucrezia left the shell after seeing us through our second Proto-Ultima win in April, but had already been attending less before then.

I found I was getting really stressed out over leading the shell, and would get unreasonably angry at small things. I especially hated when we had over 18 people, but not quite enough for dual runs to be successful. Plus no one wanted to be on the "coin farming" runs, even if I had someone I could trust to lead them. I was happiest on nights when we had 12 to 18 people show up, and we could just trounce zones, but even then people would find ways to irritate me. :-)

In mid-June, I gave a 6-run notice, and left the shell after using the Ultima and Omega chip sets I'd been collecting. Limbus, once my favorite thing in the game, had become something that caused me undue stress, and it just wasn't worth the aggravation any more. I got Erock and Wyat more involved with the runs before I left, and Erock's done a great job since he took over. I do miss the Proto-Omega and Proto-Ultima fights!

"Who's Your Mommy!"

Has it really been a month since my last entry? Oh dear...

TheNewUltimates celebrated their second victory over Proto-Ultima a week ago Sunday. We went with the same mage-heavy set up:

PLD/NIN PLD/NIN NIN/DRK RDM/DRK BRD/WHM WHM/BLM
BLM/RDM BLM/RDM BLM/RDM RDM/DRK BRD/WHM SAM/RNG
SMN/WHM SMN/WHM COR/WHM RDM/DRK RDM/DRK WHM/BLM

I talked Ryken into coming as the other PLD/NIN, since he needs to use his Homam pants and boots more often. It's such a fun fight, probably my favorite in the game (especially when we win), so it wasn't too hard to convince him. He seemed a bit hesitant at first, but it could well get him to fall back in love with his PLD.

The fight went really smoothly, though we did have a handful of deaths through out the final 20%. All of the Dissipations were stunned, which saved us so much grief. Ryken's massive Galka HP kept him alive through two Citadel Busters, but he resisted less on his third one, and did end up dying. I was hit by one or two myself, but it wasn't my HP that saved me - it was my gear. I didn't die the entire fight, which surprised me a bit.

The sad part of the win is that Lucrezia has now left TNU. Several months ago, he expressed his need to free up some of his time, but promised to stay until we'd beated Ultima twice. I'll really miss having him there, but we'll soldier on.

We got three drops - two for the turban and one for the manteel. Meshe and Morgoth were still under our veteran clause and each took a turban, and Fliggity was first in line for the manteel, being the only person with the top job priority for the piece (BLM or WHM). It's so nice to have a few more pieces of Nashira in the shell! Hopefully we'll beat it every time from now on, since we seem to have got a strategy that works for us.

The Liberation of Temenos

It's been a some time since my last Limbus update, and it's a bit overdue now, since not only did we manage to finally wrest a heart from Proto-Omega (and tear off a foreleg while we were at it), we finally beat Proto-Ultima! Hurray! It wasn't pretty, but a win's a win, and it was much much better than our previous attempts. We opted for a "manaburn" strategy, and were very mage-heavy. Venn was the only non-caster in the group. Our team for the win was 2xPLD/NIN, NIN/DRK, 2xWHM, BRD, 3xRDM/DRK, 4xBLM, 3xSMN, BLU, and DRG.

The crucial Dissipation at 19% health didn't get stunned, but it didn't spell disaster for us as it usually does either. Having fewer people up close to Ultima helped enormously for the AOE attacks like Armor Buster, and we were really good about leaving the Citadel Buster target alone with Ultima. I did survive the one that hit me (lots of magic damage reduction gear), but the following attack for over 200hp knocked me out of the fray. I believe it was a DOT spell that ended up killing Ultima, but it was so exciting to finally see that evil biomechanical thing collapse to the ground. We ended up with two legs, and sadly the treasure assignment caused some drama, but hopefully we'll have more wins soon, and more mages with bits of Nashira gear.

Our chip farming runs are generally pretty mundane these days. Our attendance is somewhat variable, so some nights we'll do one zone with 16-18 people, romping through quickly, other nights we'll scarcely have enough for two successful runs, so often we will have one team of 6 sent off just for coin farming. We try to mix things up between Apollyon and Temenos, but whichever we do, someone complains about not doing the other. There's no pleasing some people!

Once in awhile, we have a particularly exciting farming run, like one recent SW Apollyon (fomor, treants, mimics, elementals). We linked nearly all of the 10 fomor on the first pull, and we wiped. Anrita had DC'd, but I'm pretty sure we still would have wiped on that. We killed just the ones we needed, took the time chest and ran up to the next floor. On the second floor, we killed just the NM treant to open the vortex, then ran up again. We had to fight 4 mimics before getting the time chest (but also managed to get items and restore chests). I think we had under 3 minutes to go when I found the time chest. We dashed up to the elementals, and had time to kill a total of 8 of them before exiting. We ended up with only 18 coins, but at least we'd got the chip.

The most fun I've had recently on a coin farming run was with a 6-man group in NW Apollyon. We had Erock as WAR/THF, Fliggity's BLM, Serenity's BLU/DNC, Anrita's WHM, Zorris' BRD, and my PLD. We killed all of the normal mobs in the zone, except for one of the wyverns, and the bosses from the first floor. We weren't careful enough around Faffy-lite, and kind of wiped, but we had plenty of time and recovered and headed up to get the baby behemoths as well. We ended up with 40 coins, which helped bulk up the coins from the Temenos chip upgrade run the other group had done. I don't think we could have beat Kaiser Behemoth with our group, but we sure had a blast with our coin farming.

In mid-January, we had an absolutely terrible Proto-Omega run, which reminded me way too much of our first attempt, but somehow we managed to win despite ourselves. We ended up with pants and boots on that run. Our next run, on Valentine's Day, was far superior. Not only was it our best performance yet (with one death - me, probably because I let myself get a bit distracted by some /tells), but we finally had the heart drop, which went to Luc for the Homam Corazza, and the second foreleg we've seen. I lotted a disappointing 282, but Toshimitsu lotted an even more disappointing 88, and I finally have my Homam Manopolas! Hurray!

Some time last month, I stockpiled enough Ancient Beastcoins for my final purchase from Sagheera, a Loquacious Earring. It seems pretty expensive for something I seem to only use for casting Utsusemi Ichi, but I'm sure I'll find more uses for it. It was nice to have in an exp party that I was in as a PLD/WHM main healer... I'll be selling my coins from here on out, which should help cover the costs of the Cosmo-Cleanse.

New Title: Temenos Liberator

Limbus Centennial

It's been a long time since I've written a Limbus update. This past Sunday's Limbus run was my 100th! I've missed only one since I joined the group over a year ago. That was because of what turned out to be a gall bladder attack on the last Sunday in November. I think what scared my husband the most about it was the fact that I was too sick for my beloved Limbus. He knew it had to be pretty awful for me to miss that. Gall bladders are funny things - apparently you don't really need them, so mine will be coming out some time when the Ontario medical system decides they can fit me in. In the mean time, I feel like throwing up constantly.

But enough of that.

Limbus has had its share of ups and downs, but in general things have been going very well. We consistently have enough people for successful runs, and for awhile there were fielding dual runs. I think things slowed down for the holidays, and with the addition of a few new people, we'll be back to regular dual runs going forward.

Proto-Omega has become fairly routine for us, but we still haven't beat Proto-Ultima, partially because people won't run away from Citadel Buster like they're supposed to, but also getting bad luck with back-to-back Armor Busters. Lucrezia's been reluctant to take us back to Ultima again until she feels we can follow instructions better, but I think we'll be trying again this week or next. I really really want us to beat that biomechanical nightmare.

Proto-Omega's been rather stingy with some of his body parts. We've got a total of 7 tails, 4 hind legs, 2 eyes, and 1 fore leg. So many of the tails that 7/8 of our eligible lotters have their boots, including me! I got mine Sunday night, along with Zaps. Thunderbolt is the only other person who could have lotted, and he passed for us. If this keeps up, all of our mages will have their own Homam Gambieras, which would be useful for those with jobs that can wear them, like Thom and Serenity.

We had a bit of drama this fall, with someone who took advantage of our overly liberal rules, and made off with two pieces of Homam (including the only godly-for-paladin hands that have dropped) in only 16 runs, and stopped showing up for runs in favor of leveling another job. He was a PLD main, and want to switch his Homam lot to one of the other jobs after he got the two PLD-priority pieces, so he could cherry-pick the rest of the set. He seemed disappointed that we wouldn't let him do that, and kept sneaking into the shell to see if we were going to do a run that he could benefit from, but we got sick of it and kicked him out. I'm still working on rule reform to prevent this from happening in the future, but for now, everyone's in good standing with the shell, so our liberal rules aren't being abused.

We've had a bit of trouble with duos and trios taking over NW Apollyon (Kings) when we need the chip to complete Omega sets. I really wish Square-Enix had made Limbus instanced so we wouldn't have that trouble. It's almost to the point where we should do the run every time we actually can get the zone, and just start sets with each sackholder.

It's still hard for me to believe Kiki actually has 2 pieces of Homam gear, despite the 100 Limbus runs. Between that, and full relic, it shows that persistence, and a good group of people to do stuff with, pays off. Who knows, maybe some day I'll have other things I never thought Kiki would ever get. :-)

First Round with Proto-Ultima

We've got enough people showing up regularly for Limbus to be creative with our farming runs. One night we had a group of 11 head to Temenos C2 to upgrade a chip for my Ultima set, while a squad of 4 headed to Apollyon SE to try to find enough coins to make up for the lack of them on the upgrade run. Lucrezia took the low-man squad, while I led the other group. We ended up with a total of 54 coins for the night (35 from the farming team), so it was definitely a good way to split our resources.

Our next run, we decided to try for the two chips I needed to complete my Omega set. I had a team of 10 for Apollyon SW (fomors, treants, mimics, and elementals), while Lucrezia had 10 in Apollyon NE (mandies, birds, pots, gigas, dhalmels). This worked out really well for us. My team finished first, I got my chip from that run, disbanded and was invited to Luc's alliance, and got the second chip when they finished. Since Apollyon's all one zone, we were able to do that, despite me being in the western "lobby" while they were in Apollyon NE. We also had a whopping 96 coins total from the two runs, so we took 4 from the bank for an even 5 per person. My group could have had a few more coins perhaps, but I took the time chests on the first two floors for safety. Then on the mimic floor I got really lucky and the first three chests I opened were items, time, and restore, so the mimic level was very quick.

On Sunday evening, we were ready to face Proto-Ultima for the first time. I was very anxious about the fight, since it sounds so much worse than Proto-Omega, and Citadel Buster sounded difficult to survive. In preparation, I bought my first magic damage gear: two Merman's Rings for -8% Magic Damage Reduction, and a Lamia Mantle +1 and Lamian Kaman for +5 Magic Defense Bonus. I adjusted my PLD/NIN macro set to add a CB gear swap, and reorganized my +HP, +enmity, and +shield macros to get it all to work better (plus I got my Homam Cosciales and Ethereal Earring since my last PLD/NIN fight, and had to add them in).

Lucrezia's overall strategy was very similar to that for Proto-Omega, but we had more RDM/DRKs and BLMs and fewer SMNs this time. We started out with Luc as my co-tank, but switched over to Eulucia. Eulucia and I stood on opposite sides of Ultima, and as we reached our hate thresholds, every move we did or damage we took had Ultima flip around to the other tank. Things went incredibly well until we got Ultima under 20%. We'd take massive damage from time to time, but the stunners were hampering Ultima, and Anrita and Toshimitsu were keeping us healthy.

When the first Citadel Buster happened, people either didn't notice it was happening, or thought it would be better to stand and fight, rather than run away like we had planned. This resulted in over half the alliance being dead. People reraised, but we never completely recovered, and we ended up wiping with Ultima around 5%. At the end, Proto-Ultima was drawing in the final survivors one by one and killing them each in turn.

We did learn a lot from the fight though, and I'm sure we'll do better next time. I actually survived the first Citadel Buster - when I had buffs up, I was hit for just under 1400 (and my max HP at that point was ~1600). A later Citadel Buster that was under 1400 killed me because I was at low health, and Armor Buster got me while weakened. My final death was a 2100+ point Citadel Buster, when I think the only thing I was missing was Shell and maybe Light Carol. It was a fun fight, and I'm looking forward to a rematch.

Last night, we headed to Temenos C3 (Orcs, Yagudos, and Quadavs) for the third chip upgrade I needed to complete my Ultima set, so we're planning to head back to fight Proto-Ultima again on Sunday. This is just the second time we've done Temenos C3 since I joined TNU, the earlier being last March. I remember it as being fairly easy then, but it was just ridiculous last night. We had 16 people, and were killing all the lesser Beastmen in under 30 seconds, and even the NMs weren't too much of a challenge. We took a lot of damage from Astral Flow on the Summoner, but no one died. One of our RDMs died on the next NM from an AOE right after he used convert, but that wasn't because the zone was tough. We ended up with 50 coins, and a Cobalt Mythril Sheet which went to Venn.

Fancy Pants

After our win against Proto-Omega less than two weeks ago, we didn't want to wait long before trying again, to make sure it wasn't a fluke and we really had a strategy that worked for us. We did two Apollyon Runs for coins and chips (SE and NW), and then on Sunday night, we mustered the forces and headed back to Central Apollyon. We had pretty much the same crew as the previous fight, but instead of Ryken and Reefermadness, Serenity was there, and two new members, Lustt and Toshimitsu. Job-wise we had one less MNK and BLM, but an extra SMN, DRG, and WHM.

The plan was the same - SMNs using Physical and Magical rage bloodpacts on the appropriate forms, while the NIN and PLD co-tanked, the BRD kept up songs, the WHMs kept people healthy, the BLMs watched for gunpods and kept up stuns and nukes, the RDMs enfeebled, refreshed, hasted and cut loose with Chainspell-Stun, while the melee mostly waited on the sides for their final frenzy.

The fight was a bit more chaotic than the last time, but it also seemed to be much quicker. Luc and I lost hate to a Chi Blast from Itera, probably because we'd been hit with Pile Pitch a couple times and hadn't regained our hate yet, but I'm not sure about that. I died in the middle of the fight (3 big hits from the two-legged form when I was stunned and couldn't do anything), but Luc had things under control, so I popped back up and ran off to the side to rest. I didn't have long though, as they got Omega under 25% and everyone rushed in for the kill. I joined in and tried to help out, but I don't think I added much. I think next time, I'll try to use Invincible and Cover on one of the RDM/DRKs to try to keep them alive during Chainspell-Stun. Hopefully we can coordinate that during the commotion of the fight.

Proto-Omega was dead, and the treasure crate contained two of Omega's Hind Legs! I was first in line for those, so I got the first one, and Venn, Lucrezia and Tye lotted on the second. Venn and Luc both passed for Tye though, since they'd got a piece of Homam on our previous run. Anrita gave Tye and I a Teleport-Mea, and we rode off to Mhaura to trade our hind legs for Homam Cosciales. I still find it hard to believe that Kiki actually has a piece of Homam gear! They're a little hard to see on Kiki, as her body armor hangs down and mostly covers them. Not to mention everything's so small on a Tarutaru...


The linkshell seems to be in really good shape at the moment. I don't know if it's because of our recent Proto-Omega victories, or just a result of more and more people getting Sea access, but we've reached the limit on the roster and have started turning people away. I think maybe we need to figure out how to make things work with more than 18 people, but I don't think having a second shell is the right approach, since that could leave one or another short-handed, and also cause rivalries between the groups. It's probably best to split people into two groups for farming and even for the Weapons fights - make sure we have 18 people with the right jobs for the weapon fights, while making sure all the people likely to be eligible to lot are part of that group, and send the other people off for farming in another area that evening.

We had 17 people show up on Thursday for our farming run, which is quite unusual, but the new people need to get 10 runs under their belts in order to be able to lot Omega or Ultima parts, so it's in their best interest to show up as much as possible, plus I'm sure they want coins and AF upgrade items. Lucrezia decided to split into two groups to maximize our coins/items and get two chips. He took a group of 8 through Temenos N (Beastmen), while I took a group of 7 through Temenos E (elementals). I felt like we were a little slow with just the 7 of us, and I ended up taking 3 time chests (got a bit unlucky on the floors I needed time chests on, which wasted some tie), but chose wisely for each of the 4 items chests, and didn't get a single avatar, so it was really a nice and easy run.

Both groups finished up at pretty much the same time, so we had Fliggity come over to my alliance and lot the chip and get the second BLM item that dropped. It's too bad we couldn't share treasure pools during the runs, as they got three MNK items, and Lustt in my team could have used one of them. We ended up with 76 coins total, which meant everyone got 4. If we'd taken the entire group into one area, we would have torn the place up, but would have had only 3, maybe even 2, coins each.

It's taken us a long long time to get to this point in our Limbus career, but it sure feels nice now that we're here.

Apollyon Ravaged!

TheNewUltimates finally beat Proto-Omega, on our third attempt. We've tried different approaches on our previous two runs, and we learned quite a bit from those frustrating experiences, but the standard strategies don't fit for our shell. Lucrezia worked really hard to put together a strategy that would work with the jobs we had available. Rather than wait for that perfect moment when everyone was actually available for a run (we've got several members "on leave" at the moment), Luc recruited two former members of TNU, two members of TU, and one friend from BEB (who we'd like to have join TNU, but he can't commit to two nights a week). So on Thursday night, we ended up going in with three parties, with 17 people total (I may not have the sub job right for everyone):

NIN/WAR Lucrezia
PLD/NIN Tsakiki
WHM/BLM Anrita
RDM/DRK Morgoth
BRD/WHM Ranzz
BLM/NIN Reefermadness

BLM/NIN Fliggity
BLM/NIN Darsonavin
RDM/DRK Elbryan
SMN/WHM Ardan
SMN/WHM Meshe
SMN/WHM Thom

DRG/WAR Venn
MNK/DRK Ryken
MNK/SAM Itera
MNK/SAM Tye
SAM/THF Helldam

Luc's plan was to have the tanks establish hate, with the help of 300% TP Spirits Within, then the SMNs would be the primary damage dealers for the bulk of the fight. They were to use either physical or magical rage bloodpacts every minute, depending on which form Proto-Omega was in (one form is magic resistant, the other is resistant to physical damage). The BLMs and RDMs were on a Stun cycle, along with nuking (and refresh). The BLMs were also on gunpod duty, with no tank helping them out, which was one of the "troubling" aspects of the strategy beforehand, but was a non-issue in the fight. The BRD would keep double march on the tanks, and double ballad on the tank party mages, and the WHM would do everything she could to keep the tanks alive and hasted.

Meanwhile, the melee were to sit on the sidelines, figuratively eating popcorn and watching the show as they would boost, meditate, or sleep for tp. At 25%, when Proto-Omega goes into a rage mode, they were to rush in, unleash the dogs of war, and demolish Proto-Omega. The main reasoning for this was to reduce the amount of TP gained by Proto-Omega, which would mean fewer nasty attacks on the tanks, and it would also be relatively hate-free, allowing the tanks to keep Proto-Omega on a short leash. It would also keep the melee out of harm's way until we were ready for a final burst of extreme damage to get him dead as quickly as possible.

We had an uneventful trip to Apollyon, and Lucrezia made sure everyone was fully aware of the strategy. We buffed up, slept for TP, and headed into the fight. At this point, I was wearing HP gear, and with Pescatora had around 1600 HP.

Luc and I ran in, and Luc voked Proto-Omega and moved him over to where we intended to fight him. We unloaded our TP, and Luc switched to his katanas, while I swapped in my haste/enmity/shield gear. With double march, Haste, and +14% Haste from my gear, I'm pretty sure I was at the haste cap, but I didn't really check my timers, as I was too busy at the time. It was really so much better than the first time we fought Proto-Omega, when I was PLD/NIN, but we didn't have a BRD in the tank party. Flash and the two Utsusemi spells were up so quickly, it really seemed so easy to stand there, casting shadows, flashing for hate, and using my other job abilities as needed to hold/regain hate. The stun cycle helped Luc and I an awful lot, stopping TP moves, and giving us plenty of time to get shadows back up.

We decided to let Helldam come in for a big weaponskill fairly early in the fight, which is something we probably won't do next time, since he pulled hate and got killed for his efforts.

Luc and I were sharing hate quite well, with the first couple pile pitches shifting hate between us, but then Luc got killed, and it took awhile for him to get his hate level back up (a bit dangerous when fighting weakened). I believe we lost control of Proto-Omega twice during this phase, but I was able to get him back over to me with a Flash and a big cure without him flattening someone. I was really happy that I was able to straight tank the two legged phase, since I feel like things get so sloppy with kiting. We only had one gunpod ejection, which the BLMs were able to quickly defeat.

The SMNs and mages got Proto-Omega down to 25% pretty quickly, and as we were switching Ranzz over to the melee party for soul voiced attack songs, I got killed by 3 big attacks of some sort that were too quick for anyone to do much about. I was stunned at the time, and couldn't do anything myself either. But the timing worked out pretty well, since everyone jumped in for the final zerg, with the RDM/DRKs using chainspell stun, and everyone going all out. I reraised and ran over to try to help out, but my flash and invincible didn't do anything at that point, since I was starting from 0 on the hate threshold at that point. He was quickly dead, and I think the only casualty at that point was Morgoth, one of ths Chainspell-Stunners. It was so exciting for us to finally win!

It's so very satisfying when a plan comes together, and everyone works well together as a team. We're so much greater as a whole than simply the sum of our parts, and we all need each other to succeed.

The treasure chest contained Omega's Eye and Omega's Tail. Based on our lotting rules, the Eye went to Lucrezia (main lot THF) and the Tail went to Venn (main lot DRG), so we finally have two shiny red pieces of Homam in our shell. And hopefully we'll be able to repeat our success, and get to the point where we can say "lolOmega" like people who are in shells that have long ago mastered Proto-Omega. Then we'll have to muster up the courage to try killing Proto-Ultima for the mages' fancy red gear. Even the lolOmega people say Proto-Ultima is a bitch.

I couldn't take any screenshots during the fight, so I've borrowed Thom's to illustrate this entry. Note the tiny spec in front of Proto-Omega in the top shot. That's Kiki, doing what she loves to do best, tanking mobs 20 times her size. :-)

New title: Apollyon Ravager

Recent Adventures in Limbus

As with Dynamis, it's been quite awhile since my last Limbus update, when I'd reached the 40-run milestone. Since then, we've been doing quite well with the normal runs, and not so well with the special runs. We've had several people join the shell, and for a brief shining moment, we had nearly full alliances for serveral runs. Unfortunately real life interfered for some people, and we're back to 10-12 people for runs on a normal night.

I still love Limbus, and have a great deal of fun on (most of) our runs, but without a consistently large group, we're just not going to get enough tries with Proto-Omega and start to see the big payoffs from all of our work (not to mention Proto-Ultima, which we don't even want to attempt until we've beaten Proto-Omega a few times). I love the variety of the different zones, and the beat-the-clock excitement on a few of them. And some of the bosses in Apollyon are just so much fun to tank. Two zones routinely give us trouble though: Temenos N, with the beastmen (the Tonberries are such a pain if someone gets aggro when we're trying to sneak through) and Apollyon NE, where the Gigants on the second to last floor so often wipe us out. But the frustration on those makes them that much better when we win.

We had a "metal chip run" in early July, again trying CS Apollyon. We thought we had a better plan than our first time, but sleep was resisted too much and things didn't go so well.

After we'd built up our forces with Fliggity, Darsonavin, Theodoric, Frostwitch, Jarbit, and Isengard, we tried another Proto-Omega run last month. We ended up with 17 people in the zone, but Lucrezia's plan went awry from the start when (one of) the melees didn't allow the tanks to get hate set up before getting the weapon running all over the place. We had 2 NINs and 2 PLDs, but we just couldn't get hate under control. I was on gunpod patrol, and I really should have gone as PLD/NIN - those things are slow and hit really hard. I didn't much like PLD/NIN on our first run, but perhaps with more practice and a Bard in the tank party, it will go a lot better. Hopefully we can try again in the near future.

My latest Limbus excitement was that I finally got the 75 Ancient Beastcoins I needed to pick up my Brutal Earring from Sagheera. It grants the wearer Double Attack if they don't have it, and enhances the effect if they do (by being either WAR or /WAR). That's a nice addition to my DD gear, and will pair well with my Suppanomimi for when I'm more interested in smacking things rather than tanking.

Limbus: Milestone

One of the many changes that is supposed to be in the update scheduled for tomorrow is an "adjustment" to the Limbus entrance fee, which has been 50,000 gil since it was introduced. People have been complaining about this for quite awhile, but especially recently, since you've actually got to work pretty hard to make gil in today's economy. It's never really been a big issue for me, since Grym and I were misers for so very long, but I have been feeling the impact of a negative cash flow.

Last week marked my 40th Limbus run - I've spent 2,000,000 gil in entrance fees. That seems like a lot of gil, but look at all the goodies I've got for that money: 144 ancient beastcoins, 3 white rivets, and 2 chunks of snowy cermet. These I've used to get some pretty nifty pieces of gear: a Boxer's Mantle (75 ABCs), upgraded AF feet (20 ABCs, white rivet, and snowy cermet), and upgraded AF pants (20 ABCs, white rivet, and snowy cermet). And I have 29 ABCs that will be going towards a Brutal Earring as soon as I have 75 of them.

The Boxer's Mantle is unique, and gives me +10 to 2 of my important combat skills: Shield and Parry. It also boosts evasion and guard skills, but PLDs evade like a brick, and have no guard skill, but it would be useful for other jobs. I use it pretty much all the time I'm straight tanking now, and use High Breath Mantles when I need more enmity.

The upgraded boots are the best boots in the game for a shield-tanking PLD. Period.

The upgraded pants were a bit of a stretch perhaps, but they are better than what I had. I do hope to replace them with better ones in the coming months, but in the meantime, I like them.

So I've got 3 pieces of gear that add to my collection of stuff to help me be a better tank, and I think they're worth more than the gil I've spent to get them.

Best of all though, I've had a lot of fun in Limbus. I wish we had enough people to fight Proto-Omega and Proto-Ultima regularly, and start getting people decked out in Homam and Nashira gear, but perhaps with the TU people we've been helping work through the CoP missions and the "adjusted" fees, we'll start getting better turnouts for our Limbus runs.

Limbus: Time for another Update

I guess it's time I updated TheNewUltimates' Limbus progress, since I haven't written anything about it for a month or so. For awhile there it looked like we'd regularly get nearly a full alliance going, but we're back to not even filling two parties most of the time, which is too bad. We're fairly regularly clearing the zones we try, adding more chips to our collections for Proto-Omega and Proto-Ultima, but without more people, we can't really attempt those either. Venn's holding all the chips he can at the moment, Ezekiel has close to a full set, but has been having real life issues this month and hasn't been playing, so I'm getting the current chips. So far I just have two "first tier" Temenos chips, which are used to enter the Central Temenos levels.

We did one "metal chip run" in mid-April, taking on CS Apollyon. It didn't go so well, but was fun to try, and we'll know how to do it better next time. The metal chip we used for this run had been a treasure drop at some point, but you can also purchase metal chips from Sagheera for 75 Ancient Beastcoins. Because it has the potential of giving us a lot of loot, we've decided to take all the "extra" coins from our runs and put them in the LS bank to fund future purchases of metal chips.

We did Temenos North a week or so ago, based on heavy lobbying from the team, and that worked out really well, since Lucrezia, Itera, Venn, and I all got items we needed for upgrades. Since I had just got my Valor Surcoat from Dynamis, there was no need to upgrade my Gallant Surcoat, and I couldn't decide if it was worth upgrading my Gallant Breeches or not. I am hoping to get better pants than those in time, but who knows when that will happen. So I decided that yes, it was worth getting my Gallant Breeches +1, and I turned in all the necessary items to Sagheera.

I mentioned this on an AF+1 thread I had started on the ffxiclopedia forums a few months back, and got chided by other PLDs who said there are better pants: Valor Breeches, Homam Cosciales, and Crimson Cuisses. This was after I had already stated that I was hoping to get the first two, but since I didn't know when that would happen, I upgraded my AF. The AF+1 legs are better for me than the Adaman I've been wearing for over a year. And the Crimson Cuisses are from gods, and I don't do gods. Oh well. People seem to not read things very well, just pick up on one thing and tear you apart over it.

However, if we don't get more people into TNU, I'm never going to see any Homam gear, and with 5 or 6 other main-lotting PLDs that need their Valor Breeches, it's not very likely I'll get those soon either. So, I'm very pleased with my new shiny white pants. I guess it's time to start re-questing my boots and pants, and I can get my AF put back into storage. I'm pretty sure I'm done with upgrades. All my coins will go for my brutal earring next.

Limbus: Limbus Update

I've fallen behind on my Limbus entries, but we've been going regularly every Thurday and Sunday evening, usually with 10 or more people each time. We've also been completing the levels, gathering more chips for future Proto-Omega and Proto-Ultima fights, and it's been a lot of fun.

We fought Proto-Omega several weeks ago, with 16 people in the alliance. We had both Thom and I as PLD/NIN and Daden as NIN/WAR for tanking. The fight was really a chaotic mess, and we were dying and reraising over and over. Hopefully we'll do better next time. I'm not positive that the /NIN really helped me all that much, as so much of Omega's attacks ignore shadows. It was so hard to get hate as PLD/NIN, especially with Flash timers so long while weakened.

Several weeks ago, Venn, Meshe, Itera and I tried to help Armageddon and Goto with CoP 6-4, the Omega/Ultima airship fight, in an effort to get them to Sea quickly. I went as RDM, and Army as PLD, with Venn as DRG, Meshe SMN, Itera MNK and Goto WHM. We tried three times, but just couldn't do it. Goto was able to do it later with a pickup party, and on Sunday he was still stuck on Mission 7-3: just 3 NMs and a Tenzen fight away from Sea.

So instead of just standing around in Jeuno waiting for our Cosmo-Cleanse to be available, the Limbus group took off on a whirlwind tour of Bibiki Bay, Carpenters Landing, and Misareaux Coast to kill the NMs for Goto. He headed to Bastok for a cutscene with Cid, while Ezekiel (SAM), Itera (MNK), Neborin (BLM), Daden (WAR), and I (PLD) grabbed Icarus Wings and waited for him in Sealion's Den. We made short work of Tenzen, and a very excited Goto got to Sea for the first time, where he apparently was promptly killed by a UFO. Then we gathered together in Port Jeuno for our Limbus run.

This Sunday's run was Apollyon NE, which is probably my least favorite of the zones. I ended up dying 4 or 5 times - the Goobbue, Greater Birds, and Giants just hit too hard and too fast. We still won though, getting 59 coins, even though we skipped the pots and some of the Opo-Opos. We also didn't need to kill the melee-resistant Gigas, which was handy, since we were light on the mages - just Thom on SMN and Neborin as BLM this week (and Morgoth's RDM). I think Goto really enjoyed his first Limbus run! We had 13 people for the run. I think our group is pretty close to being full now, since several people were missing because of the Easter holiday. As more members of TheUltimates get Sea, they'll start a second Limbus shell.

This run put me over the 75 Ancient Beastcoin mark, so last night I went to see Sagheera in Port Jeuno, and finally bought my Boxer's Mantle from her. Hurray for 10 more Shield Skill! I think that puts me at 312 Shield Skill. I'll have to see how the enmity loss from not using High Breath Mantles works out, but I'm hoping this will be my default mantle until I get my hands on either a Valor Cape or Shadow Mantle... hahahaha... /sigh

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!

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.

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.

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.

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.

Limbus: NE Apollyon

We headed to NE Apollyon on Sunday, going for the win, since we needed the chip from there for our eventual fight with Proto Omega. We had 11 people for the run: Venn, Kojita, Ezekiel, Lucrezia, Itera, Ranzz, Meshe, Alfrodo, Neborin, Thom, Kiki. This zone has regular mobs and multiple "boss" mobs on each floor, one of which will open the vortex to the next level, and one will drop the item chest. If you're lucky, you don't need to kill all three, nor do you need to kill all of the lesser mobs on each level. So we skipped quite a few mobs on our way to try to save time.

The first level has mandragoras and a Goobbue boss, and it went a lot better then it had on a previous run. The second floor has vultures and giant birds, and the item chest on that floor had the elusive Blue Rivet needed for upgrading DRG AF. Venn and Kojita were please to finally see it, and Venn won the lot. Then, as we were about to move to the next floor, Ezekiel suggested we drop the alliance to have one party move up to the next level, and fewer mobs would spawn as a result. Just as Kojita was typing "Don't drop the alliance until the treasure has dropped", Venn broke the alliance, losing the coins and the Blue Rivet in the treasure pool. :-( Hopefully we'll find another one again soon.

The Pots and the Dolls on the third floor weren't too challenging, but the fourth floor, with its Opo-opos and Gigas NMs was really tough, mostly because we had two of the Gigas at once. The trio of Gigas NMs each has a different immunity. One's immune to ranged attacks, one to melee attacks, and the third is immune to magic attacks. We died a lot here, but finally got up to the final floor, where we had about 10 minutes to kill 8 Dhalmels to spawn the final chest. It was a really close race against time, but Lucrezia and Ranzz ran off to the chest spawn spot while we were killing the final dhalmel, and they were able to get it open in time. We ended up with a total of 41 coins for the run, but we got the win, and another chip needed for Omega.

Limbus: Two More Wins (Apollyon NW and Temenos W)

Last Sunday, Itera joined TheNewUltimates. Hurray! He had been easing back from the game, and was planning to mostly retire, partly because we were no longer really doing anything together since I left Snakes. I didn't want to be the one to feed his addiction and drag him back into the game, but I have been blabbering incessantly to him about how fun Limbus is and how much I really thought he would like it. Friday night, I was complaining to Thoron about everyone quitting, and apparently he talked to Itera Saturday morning and talked him into applying to TheUltimates for Dynamis and TheNewUltimates for Limbus. So Mrs. Itera, it's all Thoron's fault, not mine. :-)

We had two full parties, and decided to head back to Apollyon NW and see if we couldn't show Kaiser Behemoth that we weren't such pushovers after all. We had Venn, Kojita, Itera, Lucrezia, Ezekiel, Thunderbolt (RDM), Sarntur, Meshe, Alfrodo, Ranzz, Ardan (SMN), and Tsakiki. It was a really fun run, and we were tearing through the mobs so fast that we decided to kill the turtle and the wyrm while we were at it. The only death before we hit the final boss was Sarntur, when the Wyrm had Terrorized me and the BLM looked too tasty to pass up.

The fight with Kaiser Behemoth went much much better this time, with more mage damage in the group to whittle away his HP. I had a better time kiting, and managed to avoid Meteor every time he used it, but I did end up getting killed once when I was too close to him and got smacked too hard a few times. Ezekiel and Venn also got killed at one point, but we managed hate well enough to keep the mages all alive. We ended up winning with 13 minutes to spare. We got 55 coins on this run, and I got another White Rivet. I may end up upgrading my Gallant Surcoat before I get my Boxer's Mantle, but since I still need another Snowy Cermet, it might be a moot point.

I think Apollyon NW might be my favorite Limbus zone so far. The mobs are tough enough that I can hold hate pretty well, the bosses on each floor are exciting fights, and having a restore chest on each level makes it easy to go all out on each of the bosses, without worrying about saving job abilities and two hours. We also usually get clean pulls too, so links are the exception rather than the rule. Plus it's just so nice to see all the coins spill into the treasure box when we kill the three "baby" Behemoths on the final floor.

Thursday night, we started out with 11 of us: Venn, Kojita, Itera, Lucrezia, Ezekiel, Thunderbolt (RDM), Sarntur, Neborin, Thom (SMN), Tsakiki and Meshe. However, we were in a rush to get into Temenos West ahead of another group, and Ezekiel pulled the first mob, not realizing Meshe wasn't yet in the zone (he'd gotten slightly lost on the way to Temenos). So we had to make the run with no WHM. I was worried that would hamper our ability to win, but it didn't. It was a lot harder than it would have been with Meshe there, but we managed. Ezekiel ended up dying at least 5 times though. I just can't hold hate off of him for long in that particular zone, partly because I usually have links to handle, but mostly because he just does so much damage. I think I died twice myself. I need to get my exp scrolls for this week.

We ended up skipping some of the slimes, I think one lizard, and two of the pugils, since we were worried we'd run out of time on the birds on the final floor. I think we got item chests on every floor, but a restore chest on the fifth or sixth floor would have been handy. The slimes especially really depleted our resources. However, we managed pretty well, and ended up with 51 coins for the run. I believe the Temenos W chip was the last we needed for a fight with Proto Ultima, but we still need one more chip from Apollyon NE, I think it is, for Proto Omega.

It's nice that we're getting consistent attendance now and have a good balance of melees and mages. We should be able to start routinely winning the zones and gathering the chips we need for the O/U fights. Hopefully we'll be able to do well with those and start getting fancy rare/ex armor pieces for people.

Limbus: Temenos West

TheNewUltimates decided on trying Temenos West again on Thursday, hoping for the win. We had 9 people: Venn (DRG), Lucrezia (THF), Ranzz (BRD), Kojita (DRG), Sarntur (BLM), Neborin (BLM), Thunderbolt (RDM), Meshe (WHM), and Tsakiki (PLD). We got a slightly late start because Ranzz and Sarntur both disconnected a couple of times, so we won't be able to pick up our Cosmo-Cleanse on Sunday until 9:15. Since Limbus is pretty short, that's not so bad.

Temenos West has "enhanced" beast on each of 7 floors, with no bosses. The chest drops are random - you could get one each of Time, Restore, and Items, but you might only get 2. The mobs on the floors are tigers, mandragoras, beetles, slimes, lizards, pugils, and birds. We skipped one of the mandragoras and two of the lizards, but cleared out the others on the first six floors. We got a bit unlucky on the Time chests and hit the top floor with about 5 minutes left to kill 6 birds, and we didn't quite manage it. I think we got 3 of the 6 birds dead, and we would have lost Ranzz if we didn't time-out when we did. However, it was a good run, and we got a total of 52 coins, which meant most of us got 6. If we keep that up, I'll have my Boxer's Mantle sooner than I thought!

I think the slime level slowed us down a bit, since they take awhile to kill. I also had a hard time holding hate off of the BLMs with the slimes. Sarntur and Neborin both died on the run, and we had several close calls with them as well. I find it so hard to use cover in Limbus, since we try to keep the fight away from the mages, so when they pull hate, I have to go running after the mob, trying to get its attention and then try to get between it and the squishy mage to use cover. There were also a few spots during the run when we had one or two links. I always have a tougher time with hate when I've got to spread my hate tools over two or three mobs. If I can go all out on one mob, with the help of Lucrezia's TA+WSs, the BLMs can hit the mobs for 1700+ damage without it blinking at them. That's not the case if I have to provoke one, flash another, shield bash a third. But it sure is fun trying. :-)

Limbus: Apollyon NW and SW

With Thunderbolt now available on Thursday Nights, TheNewUltimates started in on a twice-a-week schedule. Last Thursday we decided to return to Apollyon NW, which we had attempted on my first night with the linkshell. We had 9 people, Venn (DRG), Kojita (DRG), Lucrezia (THF), Ranzz (BRD), Thunderbolt (RDM), Meshe (WHM), Ardan (SMN), Neborin (BLM), and Tsakiki (PLD). The run went pretty well. On the first floor, we fought all of the ghosts and then the Doomed boss. On the second floor, it was buffalo with a Ram boss. The third floor has buggards, but we skipped the Turtle boss, since it took us so long to kill the previous time. The fourth floor has wyverns with a Wyrm boss, and we skipped him as well to get up to the three behemoths that drop 5-7 coins each. We mopped them up, and still had plenty of time to try to kill the final boss, Kaiser Behemoth, but we just couldn't do it. He pretty much has to be kited, and we were a bit low on ranged/magic users, and I don't have a lot of experience with kiting. He got me with Meteor a couple of times.

But it was a lot of fun, and it was nice to have no deaths until Kaiser Behemoth kept killing us over and over. We got the AF+1 items for SAM and NIN, and a total of 42 coins for the run.

On Sunday, we had to start a bit late, since we can't get Cosmo-Cleanse from Sagheera until 72 hours after we've last entered Limbus. We'll have to try to get going quicker on Thursdays so our Sunday runs don't run too late. At least Limbus is pretty quick, so I wasn't up to an ungodly hour playing my silly game.

We decided to try Apollyon SW, with a crew of 10: Venn (DRG), Lucrezia (THF), Ranzz (BRD), Meshe (WHM), Thunderbolt (WAR), Ezekiel (SAM), Thar (RDM), Sarntur (BLM), Neborin (BLM), and Tsakiki (PLD). Thunderbolt has so many jobs at 75 that he gets told which is best once we've decided where to go. For this area, there are four floors. You're only allowed to open one chest on the first two floors, so you have to decide whether you need the time chests or the item chests. It's best to not use the restore chests on these floors, just because it's a bit of a waste.

The first floor has 10 Fomor, and they are clumped in groups, so we rarely had one at a time. They were pretty soft though, and went down quickly. We took the time chest on this floor. The second floor has Treants, which spawn another monster when you kill them - sapling, bee, beetle, bird, etc. I ended up getting killed by the sapling spawn, since it had put us all to sleep a few time. The final time, I kept getting interrupted as I tried to cure Meshe to wake him, and I died, but no one else did, so it was OK. We continued on, and I still mostly tanked while weakened. This floor has a boss Treant, and fortunately I got unweakened just as we started fighting him. He was definitely the hardest mob of the bunch, with a nasty nasty AOE poison that nearly ended up killing Sarntur. I think he was down to 24 HP before someone got him unpoisoned. We ended up missing one of the Treants before we headed up to the next level and didn't get a chest for this floor.

The third floor has a bunch of chests that all look alike. Most of them are Mimics, but the time, restore, and items chest are here as well. On this floor, you're allowed to open every chest, so we got items, time, and restoration. The mimics are annoying as mimic always are, but we headed up to the final floor with plenty of time. On the fourth floor, there are trios of elementals. You can kill all of them if you like, hoping for single ancient beastcoins from each, but if time is pressing, the trick is to kill the trio for the element of the current day (or maybe it's the day you entered Limbus). This trio will drop the final chest. It was Watersday, so Ezekiel pulled the trio of Water Elementals, we killed all three, and Ezekiel ran off to open the chest.

We'd cleared the zone, and got the charcoal chip, which is one of four needed for Central Apollyon (Proto Omega). We had a smaller haul of coins on this run, just 26 for the 10 of us. The AF+1 items we got were for NIN, THF, and BST.