~big update

hey diabolos!

Simkiel, Survive, and I migrated to Diabolos on Saturday, to join Grenkinne and RDMpizzaHut!

I must say, it has already been worth $25. On saturday, we merited for a short time, and kicked ass! We parsed a little over 20k/hr, and the exp just rolled in!

The shell we joined seems to be social in nature, but Gren bought a new pearl, which will be created sometime soon.

Sunday was a busy day. We started off with ENM (no notable drops), then we went to Horlais Peak, and finally got Sim his final Brown Belt item. Congrats!

Pokers and Menthe joined us for a ISNM3K run, which went very well. Congrats to Pokers on the Khroma ore!

After the successful merit party and ISNM run, I figured we could try a salvage run. While we weren't fully prepared, I figured it would at least be a good dry run. It was the first time I had ran one, so I wasn't prepared.

The run went pretty well. We farmed a few too many cells, but oh well. We were able to pop the 2F rampart, and we were able to fight SIX NMs!

Drops:

Congrats to Surv!
Congrats to Menthe!

I lootwhored, netting both usukane pieces.
We will probably be doing this salvage again sometime soon, so we can explore the floor more, and hopefully get sim some of the usukane pieces.

/facepalm

First the good news: I finally dinged 37 on Dancer! Subjob complete!

Still need to find a seller for Black Belt Items.

Congratulations to Sim on his Forager's Mantle from the ENM on Monday.

Monday was a disaster with TN. Ultima owned our group. Our plds did a decent job, only one was able to tank consistently well, and he died due to lack of support. I'm pretty sure the BLMs were retarded, as I saw one Manafont right after Magic Shield. If a group of 17 cant kill ultima, we have no business being there. We wiped at ~7%.

The following Salvage was equally as retarded. We attempted to farm Bhaflau Thickets. Unfortunately for our group, in order to farm Bhaflau NMs, you must pop the Ramparts. We did not see a single one. A giant 'FUCK YOU' to the douches who can't read simple battle instructions. RAGE.

Nyzul will conclude on Saturday, regardless of our degree of success.

finally!

TN might last a bit longer than I suggested in my previous post. After an extremely long wait for limbus to start (downtime for ~3 hours), they cancelled the run. However, a SMALL group of them did SALVAGE. FINALLY, an event that I actually want to do- and we did it with 8 people. We did SSR, and the run was pretty rough, as I was pretty rusty on pulls, and it was Sim's first salvage run. We also didn't get any drops, so that didn't help at all. But at least we did a run.

I went as thf, which was pretty lame, as I'm not really geared/macro'd for it. I threw together some crap, and it sorta worked, but my damage was pretty lame. This makes leveling mnk even more important.

Sim wants to do Contaminated Colosseum for his last brown belt item, so we will probably hit that up soon.

We were able to get through floor 75 in Nyzul, so we only have 25 floors left. Synergy missed the last 15 floor climb, so he will have to make them up. Surv and I are going to Oregon this weekend, so we will resume Nyzul on the 11th of July.

As long as last night's salvage run wasn't a tease, once Nyzul wraps up, we will probably break this shell. However, it's a bit too soon to make that call. If we do break, we may reform in the fall once surv has a normal schedule. This split shift crap is severely draining her.

Plans

This is sort of a 'thinking out loud' post.

I will probably give the TN trial period another week or so. If they continue to throw massive amounts of people at events, I don't think I will be joining. I would also like to do a salvage run with them to get a more complete perspective. If it doesn't turn out to be a good fit, then I'm thinking of expanding this shell- concentrating on salvage, and maybe expanding into low-man sea fights- namely T1 jailers, and lowman limbus. If Gren comes back to Siren, this would make this pipedream more realistic.

We would have to recruit some new members, and this would run the risk of being overly-selective. We would need about 4 people- preferably a WHM main, a BRD would be nice (although I will probably finish mine for non-melee friendly fights), and two others who have both melee and mage jobs. Also PST-oriented time zone would be preferred.

At any rate, this all depends on how TN works out.

/endspeculation

I finally hit 71 yesterday, and Sim and I broke trial knuckles. yay! Today, sim and I will go kill the WSNM, and start on breaking sim's destroyers.

Surv is working crazy hours, so she will probably only be able to play weekends.

Salvage on Saturday will hopefully be a 61-80 climb. The end is in sight!

limbus

On Monday, Simkiel and I attended a Limbus run with TwilightNocturne/SuperDuper.

Took awhile to gather together- actually took longer than the run itself. I was sort of surprised that we did the run with 18 people, instead of breaking into two groups. With 18 people attacking a mob, there isn't a whole lot of information that can be gleaned. Sounds like this group has fun socially, but I couldn't tell how skilled they were. I really hope there isn't 10+ people on salvage runs.

Unfortunately, I learned virtually nothing about TN/SD, other than they can throw 18 people at mobs in an easy limbus and win. Anyway, we still have time to learn during the trial period.

Monk has been... interesting. I was able to get 66-70 pretty quickly, but once I hit 70, I've been hit with some crappy parties. I think I'm 10k tnl, and its taken 6 parties to get 24k. Hermes' sandals are nice- finally get some movement speed!

Maat's Cap: O

Maat's Cap!

After ~3 years, Surv and I finally obtained the cap!

Surv had a day off of work, and was able to finish BST and DRK in one day! (despite getting in a party with a douche brady-guide thf: nice poof pants)

Thanks to Sim for getting the last ~4M exp with us.

We also applied to TwilightNocturne for some endgame activities.

I will be working on the last 9 levels of MNK, getting DNC to 37 (which I think might actually be fun), and working on merits for MNK and SAM.

Surv will be working a lot for the next 10 weeks.

It would be great to finish up Nyzul Isle- only 45 floors to go!

bst

hurray for level sync, anniversary rings, and bst burn pts!

The last few days have been great for bst, as conditions have allowed us to get surv (syncee) from 54-59! Sim dinged 75 yesterday on bst, congrats to him! I am at 64, meaning I only have 2 levels left until Maat's cap! That should only be one or two more bst burn parties for me!

Surv's last week as a substitute teacher is this week, so she is excited to be done with her classroom of ill-mannered, sniveling dirt children. She was able to land a summer job, so she will be in training for that on the next two saturdays. Because Nyzul Isle is on Saturdays, we will push this back to Sunday for two weeks, and just farm boss floors- as hellslayer (UK) will not be on.

I was able to destroy Maat on RDM on Sunday (I took a 18 damage Stone III), meaning BST and DRK are my only two Maat fights remaining. Oddly enough, Surv has the same two fights left as well.

After Maat's cap: Sim, Surv, and myself will probably apply to TwilightNocturne.

bg is gold

There is some hilarious shit on bg. This was last month's post. This month they have a SE random response generator, which is as equally funny.

This is copypasta'd from bg:

Exerpts from the book of Brady

Yea, let us begin. Praise Brady. Thank you all for coming today on this day of worship of the mighty Brady. Amen. Today we shall read from the Book of Brady. Yea, let us begin.

From the Book of Red Mage, chapter 2: Lo, and Brady said unto the Vana'dielites, 'Thy Mages of Red, being different in the eyes of Brady from other mage jobs, I say unto them, for I am the LORD, that thou shalt raise thy sword in the name of Brady, for you are the Warrior Mages of the Vana'dielites.' So spake Brady, who is the LORD. So hearing the proclimations, the Mages of Red went forth to melee in the name of their LORD Brady, and heeded the words of the LORD to have always need of extra Hit Points, for in his mercy, he told them so.

Amen.

Turn now to the Book of Dark Knight, chapter 12. And the LORD Brady came unto the peoples of vana'diel and spake 'Yea, though thy Knights of Dark thresh thine enemies as they thresh thine wheat, thou shalt never forget that the Knights of Dark must always remember to cast their spells of Thunder upon the infidels and beasts of the land, lest they rouse the wrath of the LORD.' And so didst the Dark Knights go forth to cast Thunder, and it was good.

Amen.

From the book of Warrior, chapter 2: Spake Brady: 'Behold! Thy warriors I have gifted with the support job of Paladin, so that they might always be in service to their LORD. Lo, for I have given them untold power in gifts of armor, defense, and hit points. From this time forward, all thy tanks shall be as these WarriorPaladins, and thou shalt want not of enmity control.' And the Vana'dielites rejoiced, for Brady was good.

Amen.

From the book of Songs: Spake Brady unto the Vana'dielites, 'Thou shalt not always treasure conformity, for yea unto the Bards who are also Theives do I bestow my blessings, for I am the LORD. Though they be not as powerful in their support of others, yea, they bringeth untold treasures unto us all.' And the Vana'dielites rejoiced, for Wind Crystals were in abundance, and the LORD Brady was good.

Amen.

From the book of Nots: And the ground shook with Brady's wrath, the clouds darkening with his malice at the arrogance of the Vana'dielites. Seventen trumpets blared in the sky with the sound of thunder, and the LORD Brady's voice, filled with wrath and ruin, thundered across the plains. Spake He: 'Ruin upon thy houses! For it is written: The ninja subjob shall only be used for Agility, for its magics are feeble, its active and passive abilities are poor, and nothing good can come of its use. Thou hast defied me in this way, and thou shalt be punished for thy use of this most useless of sub jobs!' And the Vana'dielites trembled, looking in envy and fear upon the subbers of samurai and warrior.

Amen.

weekend update

Huzzah! 3 day weekend!

This weekend was very productive. Our DRK/MNK/RDM static started at level 50 on Friday, and logged off Monday night at level 61! Survive has 17 levels left until Maat's cap, and I have ~6! (will probably end up leveling Red Mage to at least 70, for an easier Maat fight). If things go well, we could end up having our caps in a few weeks! (Anniversary Rings on BST, all right!)

Surv is pretty excited, as she can see the end of our Maat's cap adventure!

After exping yesterday, Sim and I decided to break his trial dagger latent, which took less than an hour to do. Due to level sync woes, his h2h skill was under 230, and he needed a skill level of at least 250 to start the Asuran Fists quest. Beseiged got him about 10 skill levels, and we were able to get him level 250 by duoing EM-T Crawlers in Bhaflau (which took about an hour). My enfeebling skills are also horribly gimped, but I was able to get them from 180-220 by spamming dia in beseiged. After the skill up adventure, we decided to kill the Evisceration WSNM. As nin/dnc, this fight took forever- but it was pretty safe.

let me try something...♦

So about a year ago we were in Garlaige Citadel exping and the dragoon we were partying with suddenly says: "let me try something", runs out and aggros 2 bats, and dies within seconds.

This SS was taken tonight. While it was not a Dragoon, it was a Samurai with a Polearm, which is close enough in my book.

interesting saturday

This past saturday was... interesting.

We started off with an ENM run (yay... galatia...), and proceeded to do Nyzul. Synergy was at floor 10, so we started there. We were able to do floor 10-25 with 4 tags. Things ran extremely well. We had to redo a 21-25 floor set due to unlucky conditions- the worst of which was a chariot family kill. We simply cannot kill those fast enough. Lamps+gear floors are also terrible. Regardless, it was a very smooth run, and Synergy appears to be exactly what we need.

Great start to Saturday, then we moved on to our planned KS99 run. We did some runs 2 weeks ago, and things went alright- so we thought we would give it another shot, only with a different fight. Only 5 people from the original group were available, and /shouting yielded a fresh crop of players. This was the worst BCNM run I have ever attended. Surv went as pld (which she hadn't touched in well over a year), and I went RNG. Surv had a 15k buffer... and DELEVELED after TWO orbs. A raise put her back to 75, but we had enough at that point. Garik, the leader, is a great player, but some overzealous DDs led to a ton of MPKing.

Will have to obtain BB items some other way, I suppose.

Exp Static update:

Surv: 47DRK
Simkiel: 68MNK
Circa: 59RDM

I have 13 levels left until Maat's Cap! Huzzah!

Update

Our start in Nyzul was pretty rocky. People showed up late, or were missing tags. Last Saturday we had our first real run. We did the 11-20 run with minimal effort, then tried 16-20 one last time, cause nothing dropped from Behemoth. We only got 2 floors in, due to a kill all enemies on an undead floor with a dahuk, and the next floor, we had to kill 5 chariots. Nyzul is not nearly as fun as salvage or assault. Also, not having Gren is a significant drawback.

We were able to get Sim an obow yesterday after several hours of camping. Congrats!

I've been trying to kill BLM Maat for some time now. Seems I always get resisted on one of my first 3 nukes. Not fun. Seems I suck at jobs that can use Elemental Magic.

Surv and I joined a KS99 group, looking to spend some of the seals that have added up over the years. We will see if we can get some BB items out of it.

The new dredg album, 'the parrot, the pariah, the delusion', leaked yesterday. I've been listening to it nonstop. It's awesome- not as good as el cielo, but still better than catch without arms. someone described it as 'the el cielo for people who liked cwoa'. I find that analysis fairly accurate.

nyzul

Starting Saturday, April 18th at noon, we will attempt to start Nyzul Isle Investigation. As of this posting, the goal is to do runs every Saturday at Noon (PST). This is subject to change or cancellation due to real life activities. Notification of any changes will be posted on the Linkshell message.

Job assignments are as follows:

Simkiel: Ninja
Survive: Red Mage (maybe Thief for boss floor sets)
Circa: Samurai
Yamigarasu: Red Mage
Hellslayer: Black Mage
Synergy: Blue Mage/Thief (boss floors)

Our floor progression will be 0-100.

You will be responsible to read up on Nyzul and make the necessary preparations. You will be expected to sneak/invisible yourself. Slowing the group down by relying on others abilities will often result in failed runs.

After finally obtaining a decent static, it appears that Askar/Denali/Goliard drops will just be distributed in pickup-style: At the beginning of each boss run, everyone picks a piece that can drop. If that piece drops, only the people who have chosen said piece will be allowed to lot.

So far, we have obtained 2 pieces of nyzul armor:

May 16: Askar Feet > Circa
May 23: Denali Feet > Simkiel

If you have any questions, please send me a /tell in-game.

goodbye gren ;/

and then there were three.

grenkinne left yesterday for Diabolos. It was sad to see him go. He will be greatly missed.

This weekend was quite productive. Sim and I were able to join a successful DM run, Surv and I were able to hit rank 7 in San d'Oria, and we all completed the new expansion.

This is a turning point for our small shell. It would be great to do events with Prophesy, Jetzt, Engage, and Evgeni- but they need to log on sometime...

We were able to get one fight away from Captain, so we may or may not do that sometime. Without Gren, though, it is no longer a priority.

Things left to do include: Nyzul Isle, Salvage, and exp.

The new exp band that presumably is released next month should help the final burst to maat's cap.

Sim has expressed interest in MNK, RNG, COR, and BLU.

Surv has BST, DRK, and SMN left.

I have BST, BLM, and RDM left.

We may have to level some completed jobs to accommodate for our interesting job combination.

Static 1: (RNG BLM SMN)
Static 2: (BST BST BST)
Static 3: (RDM DRK MNK)

I would like to hit 75MNK, perhaps that could be grouped with Sim's COR and Surv's SAM or something.

I suppose once we are done with Nyzul and Salvage, it will be time to call it quits.

...AMAZING!


; ;

ahoy

Friends zephir/ventulus/khao/evgeni, flashman/zosch/jetzt, prophesy, and jisatsu/engage have migrated back to siren! They have their own ls, VirusLS- so we will probably be doing stuff with them in the future. (merging?)

Assault! we went and raped count dracula last night. Sim did a great job kiting, and we were able to win in about 15 minutes. AMAZING!

We got a random kclub drk to help us zerg another assault, but we wiped at ~20%. I'm sure we would have won if I had gone SAM, as my RNG did jack shit.

On the exp front, I was able to ding 66SMN on sunday, and I destroyed maat on monday. Darksday + Sleepga = hax.

I'm hoping to get some of the final assaults out of the way before Gren migrates to Diabolos. He will be missed.

Next static will probably be more informal than prior statics.

Jobs remaining until Maat's cap:

Circa: BST (60) BLM (48) RDM (41) DRK (67 - just need to kill maat)
Survive: BST (54) DRK (40) SMN (25) BLM (66 - just need to kill maat)

fl

Congratulations to everyone~ we are now all First Lieutenants! While we will not be able to 4-man the last 5 assaults, we may have some of Grenkinne's friends help us out.

Also: Congrats to Sim for obtaining a Rajas! 6+ months of missions finally pay off! Sim's has pretty much obtained all the realistic gear he can.

We are nearing the end of the SMN/BLM/NIN/THF static! I hit 63 last night, meaning I only have ~75k exp left or so. Surv will probably switch to RDM when she hits 66, so she can grab some a few merits while I finish up SMN.

The next static will either a be similar combination of jobs (survive on SMN, myself on BLM, sim on a melee job, gren- on diabolos/ninja), or Surv on DRK and myself on RDM. All up to what we feel like playing, I suppose.

With us wrapping up Assaults, we should probably try to start up a Nyzul static, so those tags don't go to waste. However, with the new update next month, we may find ourselves with some new goals- some of the new augmentation gear looks pretty awesome.

finally

congrats to sim! After ~4 months of ENM, we got our second Hagun last night, and Simkiel was next in line. (Nice lot(11), lol) After acheiving T9, Sim was also able to score his Perdu Blade, effectively making him a Rajas Ring away from total Ninjar pimpage.

Speaking of Rajas... Sim is also very close to receiving his. His CoP static was able to destroy Tenzen on Monday, netting him sea access!

Sometime we will have to go farm some sea organs for the WS gorgets/elemental obis.

Oh, and our NIN/THF/BLM/SMN static is now 51- so close to the Aht Urgan Areas. I have about 64 levels to go before Maat's cap (~1M exp). Only a few months to go!

Congratulations T9!!

We were able to obtain T9 Second Lieutenant last night! Although the mini-games required to be promoted are long and someone pointless, they were quite easy to get through last night!!

Onward to FIRST LIEUTENANT and only 10 more assaults to go until we are CAPTAIN status!!

update

The lowbie static that we started last week has been going well, as we have gone from 31-44. Too bad it will only be smooth sailing for another 10 levels or so, and then we will have to get creative with party setups and camps. It is becoming more and more difficult to find a competent 6th member, so in old zones I have pretty much just given up. Too many people are afk while seeking, or princess players who are unwilling to sync or move out of their comfort zone. I think this attitude is part of what is killing this game.

Assaults are progressing smoothly! We won 3/4 tags last night, suffering our first loss in a long time. We are T8, with only 12 assault missions left until captain. Sim only needs T9, and he can get his Perdu Blade. He also finally beat U/O, so he is only a few CoP missions away from that almighty rajas.

ENM has continued to yield nothing. It has been fairly depressing.

Also, Grenkinne will be migrating to Diabolos whenever we achieve Captain rank. He will be missed.

new static

Surv and I destroyed maat on ninja and war, bringing our total maat jobs to 11/15!

Our new setup will be Ninja (Gren), Thief (Simkiel), SMN (Circa), and BLM (Survive). While I don't know how efficient this setup will be, we will give it a shot anyway. Hopefully it will work until 55...

We will probably do some Assaults tonight. This will bring us to T7+10/25, bringing us ever closer to perdu weapons.

I did salvage with Revelations last friday, and scored some lol15usukanelegs. Apparently everyone else had the drop, so it was nice. We wiped on LAC.

ENM on Thursday, exp all weekend. Maybe ISNMs if Cheki joins us.

t6

Congratulations to all who ranked up last night! We are now T6, which is halfway done with all of the Assaults!

We also did another ENM run, but we didn't get anything to drop. We also tried the 'Shadows of the Mind' ISNM, and wiped 2/4 runs. I'm thinking we should push this back until one of us hits 75BRD, as we had too many deaths.

Sim has CoP tonight, so tonight is free. Unless anyone else has any better ideas, Thursday-Sunday will probably be solid exp, where we should be wrapping up another set of jobs (66).

I have about 95 levels or so until Maat's cap, so I am starting to draft out what I would like to do once Surv and I have completed it. 75MNK, blackbelt, and salvage are on the list, but Maat's cap is the priority at the moment. Hopefully we can get it by the summer. I know surv is working on aquiring a full set of HQ elemental staves, and I know there are some other pieces that she would like as well. Perhaps after Assaults are done we can start farming Nyzul Isle a bit. Who knows? We might just score some NM drops as well.

I recently spoke to a old LS leader, Zephir/Ventulus/Khao, who is on Diabolos. Apperently the whole crew that I used to roll with is on that server now. He mentioned something about maybe coming back to Siren eventually. It would be nice to hang out with those guys again.

victory

Last week we attempted to do the Leujoam Sanctum T3 Escort Assault. We attempted to leeroy it, and it did not turn out well. Yesterday we came back for a second shot at it. Sim led the charge as Ninjar, Gren came as Thief, Surv and I came White Mage (repose spam) along with Cottoneyejoe, who also needed the win. Sim and Gren, with their movement speed+ gear, went and trained most of the mobs around the zone. Surv, Cej, and I took turns sleeping mobs that were in the path of the NPC. Fortunately Gren and Sim were able to stay on top of Reraising themselves, so us white mages could sleep. Sim and Gren each died at least once, but we were able to get the win, thanks to their sacrifice. This was the final T3 fight, so we all (including Cottoneyejoe) were able to rank up to T4 Lance Corporeal (Gren was able to rank-up to T5). Congrats!

Over the weekend, Survive beat Maat on Samurai, and I beat him on Ninja. We now have 10/15 Maat jobs. All Right! We are now all geared up and ready to go for the THF/NIN/WAR/RDM static, which is now 52 (400 tnl), hoping for 54 (yay birds!).

Sim's dynamis shell has been flakey lately, so I'm not sure if he has that tonight or not. If he doesn't get dragged to that tonight, I'm thinking we can burn the rest of our tags in Assault, then hit up some ENM. If Sim is busy, perhaps Gren, Surv, and I can burn Under Observation.

le weekend

Friday, Sim returned from his deathbed to join his CoP static for Promyvion - Vzahl. Surv, Gren, and I joined his group to escort them up to the spire, and to do the ENM 'Pulling the Plug'. Sim's group was able to win the battle (Congratulations!), while we didn't fare as well, wiping with the mob at ~30% (I should have 2hr'd).

We then did some T3 assaults. After losing twice to 'Sagelord Elimination' earlier in the week, we decided to take another crack at it... This time, we cleared all of the trash mobs, and were able to take the Sagelord down with relative ease. We then proceeded to win the Lebros Cavern and Illrusi Attoll T3s, which were quite easy. Sim forgot to grab a tag earlier on, so we had to stop. I think we are now 15/25 of the way to T4.

Saturday and Sunday were centered mainly on exp. Over this weekend, we went 59-63. We mostly grabbed a level 57 or 58 and 5-manned Lesser Lolibri. We also 4-manned for awhile to skill up. Surv got Tachi: Yukikage, which is very nice with her Zanbato. Survive and I only have 2.5 levels left on Ninja and Samurai! Maat's cap is pretty close now, as surv and I only have about 100 levels, and about 6 Maat fights to go.

Saturday we were able to do Sheep in Antlion's Clothing ENM again... and we finally got a decent drop! We got a Hagun! Gren passed, and I won the lot, meaning I cannot lot on the next 3 Haguns. I am waiting for this Hagun to sell on the AH, so I can buy a Kirin's Osode, Alkyneous' Bracelets, and a Flame Ring, which will essentially complete my buyable gear for Samurai.

After the ENM, we forced Simkiel to come with us to the Boyhada Tree to camp Aquarius/Skill up. We killed a round of Robber crabs, and Aquarius popped. Surv noticed someone running towards it, so she claimed it and got owned while we tried to kill the Robber Crab we were engaged with. She homepointed, and as she was on her way back, Gren aggroed it. We decided to fight, hoping that Survive would get back in time. Simkiel tanked it well, took a few hits, and hate was shared between him and Gren for awhile. Samurai weaponskills and skillchains did virtually no damage to it, but yuki and kashi both were lifesavers for the blinding and paralyzing additional effects. Sim and Gren got into red for awhile, and were finally taken down, with Aquarius at <10%. My shadows were stripped and I was taking a few hits when Aquarius finally went down. Survive showed up shortly after, and Sim was able to get his shiny new Francisca. That was an exciting fight.

stuff

I suppose I should probably update this... It's been nearly a week.

NIN/SAM/RDM/BST static is now 59 (/hurray), and we were parsing ~15k/hr 5-manning birds at level 58. That was pretty fun. Surv (SAM) and the random DRG were destroying birds with polearm skillz. Sim was hitting decent rampages, too.

We have been on a slight exp break following the byakko success. This has been due to the need to farm. On... Sunday? Grenkinne, Survive, and myself did some more Under Observation runs. Nothing dropped, save for a Peacock Charm (Mine). We also did ENM on Monday, and got a Forager's Mantle... our first decent drop in ~12ish ENM runs. Continuing my lootwhore status, I won the lot on it. My Peacock Charm finally sold, and I was able to buy some Cursed Haidate -1, which (using the Dryadic Abjuration: Legs) turns them into Shura Haidate +1. At 2.2M, they are pretty nice pants... that I cannot efficiently wear yet.

Speaking of gear that I need/want: Gren, Surv, and I have been up in Upper Delkfutt's tower the last few days. We have been slowly meriting/farming shields. So far we are 0/3 on Pallas, and 0/6 on Alky. I want the Alky bracelets for SAM, hoping to save myself ~700k. Last night Gren and I went over 2 hours without a single moldy buckler drop. That was beyond annoying.

In order to wear Byakko's Haidate (tp)/Shura Haidate +1 (ws) and maintain a 6-hit, I need to cap the Store TP Group 1 Merit Category. This has also been a focus this week. I joined a crappy merit party, and got nearly 4 merits in a few hours. As of this posting, I need <2k exp to cap Store TP. Woot.

Sim has been sick this week, so our plans to camp Aquarius for him havn't been a reality as of yet. His CoP static, normally on Wednesday, was moved to Friday. I think we will probably join his group to escort them up to the spire. There is also an ENM at the top, so we might be able to do that too. We will probably go as RDM SAM SAM- and maybe get a Toredor's ring out of it. That would be nice. Either way, it will be fun.

Sheep in Antlion's clothing on Saturday night.

win

Never again. No more sky! Thursday night marked the last 3 Byakkos per our deal with Revelations. Fortunately for us, we were able to get everything we had hoped to get. We started off popping the 3 Ullis, and farmed Aura Statues while we were waiting. We ended up getting another Diorite, so we stuck around to pop another. We then traveled to Byakko to pop him 3 times. The first pop yielded no useful drops. (1/4 on Haidate overall, 0/3 on the last 3 kills) The second pop dropped Byakko's Haidate and Dryadic Abjuration: Legs (Shura Haidate)!!! Being next in line, I lewtwhored and took both. (2/5 on Haidate overall) The third and final pop dropped Survive's Haidate, and we were able to walk away victorious. (3/6 on Haidate overall). Thanks to everyone in Revelations who came out and killed Byakko for us! Good times.

I am saving up for the Cursed Haidate -1, which cost ~2M. If anyone wants to hit up some BCNM/KSNMs, I am down.

Grenkinne spent the evening in Sacrarium and got Dulce a Swift Belt! Congratulations to her!

Tonight we will probably finish T2 Assaults! Over the weekend we will probably exp/farm/AF, with ENM on Monday. Simkiel will be starting up Dynamis again (Saturday and Tuesday), and will be resuming CoP on Wednesdays.

Now that our sky goals are complete, our focus has returned to exp, assaults, and ENM. Salvage at this point will probably be a distant future event.

weekend recap

This weekend was pretty much all about leveling. Our RDM/NIN/SAM/BST static went from 48-54 this weekend, which is pretty nice, even though we were averaging ~6k/hr. Gren is getting the hang of RDM, and is pretty much able to stay on top of the haste/refresh cycle. Survive has been having fun with a 6-hit setup at level 50 with her soboro (WS for 100-200, but who cares- its fun). Simkiel is grinding through BST, one level away from that elusive Rampage- I think he dinged 62 last night. As for me, ninja is tough. Keeping hate, spamming spells, wsing... etc. I need to work on gear swaps too.

While people were afk and whatnot, I attempted to pop Beryl-footed Molberry, who has a ~15% drop rate on the Hototogisu (level 55 offhand katana). The mob itself isn't too bad, but it uses Mijin Gakure, which can really mess you up if you don't resist. The pop item itself spawns once every 2 hours, so camping this thing can be a tedius project. Gren and I went 0/3, then Surv came out for the last two kills, and we went 1/5. During the downtime/clearing the pop room, I farmed Tonberry Cutters to get a scroll of Hojo: Ni. Finally got one right before the 4th NM pop. Saved me 20k, lol.

Sim has also continued his lootwhore madness. He finally got a Senju for his Ninja (hurray!), and also got a Serket Ring on his ODS run.

I would like to resume Assaults tonight, if everyone is on and/or willing. With 4 tags, I would like to do 4 assaults. We have to first do Golden Salvage for Sim, and then we can start T2s. For our setup, T2s look fairly easy.
-For Orichalcum Survey, it looks like RDM SAM NIN BLM will be effective there (or SAM/DNC instead of BLM). All we have to do is kill worms (again), and do some mining using a key item pickaxe.
-For Pre-Emptive Strike, just have to kill 13 Mamool Ja Executioners. RDM NIN SAM SAM setup here, duh.
- Lebros Supplies- this one looks annoying, but we need to get it out of the way. There are some decent guides on wiki if you want a summary. In short: bring movement speed+ gear. We will also try to do this at night for sim's +25% movement speed boots.

I don't know what Revelations is doing this week yet, but if it's anything like previous weeks, we will probably be doing sky on Tuesday, so we can finally use those Diorites.

ENM on Wednesday probably.

assault

Last night we decided to do a few assaults. Sim, Surv, and myself were Private Second class, so we were still stuck on the T1 fights. We did Leaujoam Cleansing, Excavation Duty, and Seagull Grounded. Sim and Surv had forgotten to get tags on prior days, so we were unable to do a fourth Assault.

Leaujoam Cleansing was cake. NIN SAM SAM RDM made short work of the worms (Rana>Gekko ftw), and Sim wondered how we lost on a prior run. It was our first time doing Excavation duty, and we really didn't know what to expect. We won with a few minutes to spare. BLM is essential in that fight, by the way. The most eventful mission was Seagull Grounded. Survive wore her crimson cuisses to direct the npc, and Gren, Sim, and I took care of the mobs. As this was our first time attempting the assault, we didn't know that the NPC freaked out at the sight of non-aggroing mobs. It took way too long for the NPC to get past the initial crab areas, and we lost valuable time figuring this out. We finished the mission with <10 seconds to spare, and didnt even open the chest. It was fun though.

Survive and I were able to rank up after Excavation Duty, and Sim just needs Golden Salvage to advance to Private First Class. I'm glad we were able to start stockpiling assault points for our eventual salvage runs.

We finished assaults around 8:30pst, so we ran out to do the Sheep in Antlion's Clothing ENM, which we could start at 9:54. It took about 30 minutes for everyone to get to the top of the mountain, return to the NPC, then run to boneyard gully. We got fairly unlucky with the ENM, as everyone died once except for Sim. Two of the lesser ants popped in close proximity, and Surv's Sleep II was resisted. Regardless, we were able to get the win... but we didn't get any of the big money drops. We will probably end up doing the ENM again next wednesday.

Congratulations to everyone! We went 4/4 on all of our events!

Probably will end up exping tonight and over the weekend, with assaults on either sunday or monday. Next week we have sky (need 3x despots, 3x ulli kills (diorite obtained), and 3x byakkos). Hopefully this will be our final sky session.

inventory +1

Tuesday was pretty much a day off. I had to be in Tavnazian Safehold around 6pst, so I figured I would stick around the Tavnazian region for a bit, maybe farm a codex or something. Just for kicks, I checked on Odqan and Upyri, and to my surprise, Upyri was up (~21-24 hour spawn). He is really hard at night, and I only had lvl 50 gear on, so I summoned Grenkinne to help me out. I left it unclaimed until he got there, and it was beyond easy. Dropped Vampire Mask and Cloak. Gren wanted the cloak for his Dark Knight, and I NPC'd the mask. Gren then proceeded to go afk for the rest of the night.

One of the conditions for us popping/fighting/killing/lootwhoring byakko was to provide Revelations with 2 Cloud Evokers. This rare/ex item is used to enter 'Ouryu Cometh,' a lovely BCNM-style battle that can last up to an hour. Basically it took an hour for everyone to gear up and gather together in Tavnazian Safehold, and even longer for everyone to get to the BCNM entrance in Riverne Site #2. I used my pop item, and allowed the Alliance to enter. Revelations was able to burn Ouryu down with relative ease. I was part of the 'clean up' crew (supposed to be taking care of adds), and as the adds were essentially supposed to be charmed/asleep at all times, I did absolutely nothing. I supposed I could have warped out, but that probably would have been bad form. Regardless, it was still incredibly boring. On estimate, I think Ouryu had approximately 60,000 hp, so he took almost 40 minutes to take down. I suppose it was worth it, as Revelations now has a shot at Bahamut v2- in which they can score some pretty sweet gear. They also got ~900k in gil drops. Fortunately, I'm not all too interested in that stuff- I'll settle for Byakko's Haidate and Inventory +1 instead.

Hopefully the last sky run will be next week!

lootwhoring: a weekend recap

After 3 attempts, we finally got a swift belt for Sim! Congratulations! Sim has really lootwhored the last few days: Optical Hat, Byakko's Haidate, and now a Swift Belt!

We went with Grenkinne and Dulce on Saturday, and killed the NMs 4 times (2 each for Dulce and Sim), and only got one belt. Its good to know that WHM RDM SAM THF NIN can take the hume down easily, and the galka with some difficulty. Good times. We will probably end up going back once Dulce gets another codex.

Earlier on Saturday, we teamed up with Grenkinne and did 'A Sheep in Antlion's Clothing' ENM. While only a galatia (sp?) dropped, we were able to complete it with ease. We also made it up the mountain in record time, which allowed us more time to do the swift belt run.

On Friday, we farmed up 3 more diorites- so we should be set there (at least with our current arrangement with Revelations). Sim tried out his shiny new haidate, and proceeded to destroy aura statues. I went THF this time, so we only had to kill 60 or so mobs for all 3 pop items. Hopefully we will resume Byakko later on this week.

Congratulations to Survive for beating Maat on Warrior and Red Mage! She has now beaten him 9 times! I beat Maat on White Mage, which brings me up to 8 Maat kills- still need to do it on Dark Knight.

Now that another job has been crossed off the list, I decided to start Ninja. Survive is on Samurai, and Simkiel is resuming Beastmaster. Grenkinne joined us as Red Mage, and we were able to get Dulce on THF. We partied for a few hours, and I was able to go from 37 to 41 (yay rings!). Ninja is a real stress on inventory space- holy crap. I don't know how you do it Sim. Anyway, I'm just a few levels away from being able to equip my Gothic Gauntlets and Sabatons, which should definitely help with tanking. Fortunately Survive has mastered Seigan/Third Eye tactics, so if I lose hate (to her), we won't get destroyed. Another job is past 40, which means more artifact quests... my inventory hates me.

haidate!

All of that sky farming has finally begun to pay off. The first Byakko that was popped on Thursday dropped Byakko's Haidate (congratulations Simkiel!) and Byakko's Axe (congratulations Survive!). The second and third Byakko didn't drop anything that great, but I was able to get some neptunal hands, as no one wanted them. So we have to farm three more diorites, and get 3 more despots, then we will be set for 3 more pops- then our deal with Revelations will expire. Hopefully we will go 2/3 on haidate for myself and surv. I still want some shura pants, too. If we don't get drops for everyone, then I suppose we can do more ENM and hope for some more cloud evokers, I guess.

sky farming

Congrats to Sim for a Dynamis-Beaucedine win!

Surv and I ended up taking a ~2hr nap after work, so we got up a little late. We headed up to sky to help Revelations with farming sky- part of our cloud evoker/byakko deal. We used Sim's and Surv's diorite, and got 2 Despots. So, we have 2 full Byakko sets that will probably be used on Thursday. We are in sort of a rush to get Diorites, so we will be farming them tonight too. Sky farming was fairly eventful- we killed MG, BB, Faust, Ulli x2, Seriyu, and Despot x2. Seriyu's kote and the Martial head dropped, so that was good for Revelations.

Hoss is trying out a new endgame LS, so best of luck to him.

post-holiday update

Lots of new developments as of late.

Firstly, congratulations to Simkiel for finally scoring an ohat!

After a long leveling binge yesterday, Simkiel went 61-64 on Monk. Survive and I dinged 65 on Warrior and White Mage, respectively. Anotsu joined us for a short time at the end, and was able to hit 69. Survive and I noticed that her warrior and my white mage were the original jobs that we had started with, almost 3 years ago. She was going to be a ninja, and I was going to be a bard. Oh, the nostalgia. Once we hit 66, Survive and I may switch jobs to something else.

Our last ENM run yielded a second Cloud Evoker. While this is useless to us, I was able to trade our cloud evoker collection to the Revelations Linkshell for 3 byakko runs each. We have to farm the Diorite, but that shouldn't be too tough. They will help us kill Ulli and Despot- then we will do all the Byakko kills at once. Hoss has clashed with Revelations in the past, and will probably not be joining us for this event. I have left the invitation open to him, should he change his mind. Should we not get enough Byakko's haidate, I'm sure future Cloud Evokers will pop in the future. I will be in contact with Revelations to figure out when we will be doing sky. I'm hoping it will be completed at the end of the month.