Monday Explorations

After getting rid of Kaerella's heavier pieces of loot, some shopping was indulged in - and I found a 40/42 armour set being offered for sale for 10,222,000 gold by a knight called NoGiveFace.  It was quite a mixture, with sorcerer, titan, knight, rogue and healer parts, with a +3 and a +1 piece, so it was no huge bargain, but it seemed like a good idea to get it anyway - while Kae may not use it for long, there should be other characters following after who'll make better use of it.

After getting Collector Ryu to make it all into the healer Dawn set, I used twelve heaven stones to get it all up to +3 - at that point Kae's defence, with SirFrancis not equipped, was 550, 4 less than her old "Goddess" 30/32 set, though of course that is generally +7, with one +8 piece, the shirt.  Moving the new armour up to +4 got the total up to 570, which is at least a slight improvement; I've so far resisted the temptation to take it to +5 or +6, as that would rather deplete my stock of lucky smelting stones.

The only other character on the same account, on the Auzura server, as Kaerella is a mage called Hazel; as she wouldn't be affected by the Strayana virus, she went over there to buy some larger mana potions for Kae - but I noticed after that that she still had some time left on old "Blessed Rewards" from when Auzura was the "Recommended" server, so I quickly took her out of Randol to make use of the extra skill and experience they offered.  Hazel was level 2 - the first thing I attacked was actually a Pandora's Box, and "killing" that immediately put her up by two levels.  A level 20 Pandora Beast was released, which I avoided fighting, I just killed some foxes and wolves, and had reached level six by the time the boosts ran out.

In the late morning Kae went out to those Elite Frenzied Berserkers in Merac again, and went up about 9% in experience.   The two groups of two fairly close together do just about respawn in time to keep a player busy; having the horse buffs is definitely a good idea, as they are protective, so that sometimes two rush in together, or a nearby Highlander joins in.

 After lunch, Kae tried level two of the Jail again, but didn't get any good drops, and, after finding that there were other people trying to farm the EFBs, headed to Dratan and the Giants instead, using quite a few of the medium-size mana pots Hazel had purchased, so that she could use Slow Shot most of the time.  This added around 12% in all, with again no useful drops.  Since it was the right direction, I did take the opportunity to ride over to the entrance to the Tomb of Theos.  Luckily I do know the way pretty well now, having taken quite a few characters there over on the Cariae server; while Giants and Golems may hit out at a rider as she passes, the only dangerous bit is riding through the Masters of Secret Technique, who as well as a physical attack do have magical skills.  It's best to have a health potion of two ready for that part.

So, the afternoon was fairly varied, adding about 12% and another 31 skill points, though not, it must be admitted, hugely productive.

I had switched the blue horse over to SirDarth, and at level 22 it gave him enough of a buff to be able to fight the Berserkers without his health bar fluctuating too wildly, most of the time - acccessories giving defence, dexterity and evasion helped, too.  I used a "purification gem" to clear the bloodseals from SirPerivale's gauntlets, which with a "four strength" seal had increased his unarmed attack by two, and gingerly used a new set of bloodseal gems.  However, the second bloodseal gem added a six strength seal, so once the third seal is used I'll have to use another purification gem and try again...

The evening was, generally, Kae versus the Elite Frenzied Berserkers, adding 20.46% without any boosts.  I do have a three-hour, double experience Blessed Iris in stock, maybe I should think about using that before too long.  Another 46 skill points got added too.

I did do a bit more window-shopping, but there isn't a whole lot of stuff around, partly because a lot of items had been put into the Merchant House system, which has been temporarily removed, so that the items are just not available, to buyers or sellers.  Ratel did ask me to return to town at one stage because he had spotted a bargain, a level 35/37 +4 mage set for two million, and wanted to borrow the money.  I teleported back, and, as he was changing characters rather slowly, bought the armour, and traded it across to him when he got there.  Hopefully he had enough gold to get Collector Ryu to convert it for knightly use.

It seems that he isn't too keen on carrying large amounts of skill points out of Prokion Temple, and would rather have mini-freezes every time he needs skill points for a new skill.  I do hope that he will compromise a bit, and at least let his healer character, Jacqueline, collect her sp in Prokion...

The Aeria people seem to have been a bit low-profile today; there was something wrong with the website in the morning, all I could get was Google's cache of it, and the "news" part of the start-up screen was on its default ("Last Chaos beta launched")...but at least the game was working!  There was apparently a demonstration last night on the Katar server, with people using their "merchant mode" signs to protest about recent changes and problems.  I wondered why there were in-game announcements asking them to move to an out-of-the-way location "to avoid lag" - in the end the GMs kicked them all from the server, the in-game equivalent of using tear gas and not exactly a tactful way to address the game's difficulties and the grievances some people have.

By the end of the evening Kaerella had gone up from a quarter of the way into level 41 to two-thirds of the way through; her drake SirFrancis ought to level up tomorrow to level 28, with any luck.  SirDarth did good work on the blue horse, getting it to level 24 by the end of the evening.  Even at level 23, though, with 22 levels of Armour Increase, the health bar did go down a bit sometimes.  It just shows how much harder the monsters are hitting now... and means no more overnight pet levelling, as now by the time that the horse has enough levels to allow SirDarth to work with a Berserker without the risk of dying, the horse is starting to get through quality stones too quickly for 100 starvation points to last for the eight hours needed.

Ratel thinks that may be deliberate, and it is certainly likely to drive up the price of horses, for people who buy them rather than train up their own.  Maybe I'll eventually make one for sale, if the price gets tempting enough, and spend the proceeds on upgrading Darth's armour a bit.  Hmm, I wonder if anyone will be selling a level 25 Royal Shield +15 then...?