A Quieter Afternoon

SirDarth passed the level 31 horse across to SirPerivale early in the morning, but Peri couldn't go out and start levelling it then, as Stavanic had asked to borrow the +13 shield yesterday, and hadn't had a chance to return it. He'd wanted some extra protection for a visit to Ratel's old adversary, the spider-boss Baal. So, it was just Darth on pet-levelling duty in the morning, LordElpus passed his new hatchling over for some tender loving care - and got it back after lunch on level eight, with 100% Sympathy, and thus able to give seven levels of pet buff, quite useful at Elpus's level. With the +5 shield and defence-improving rather than hit rate accessories equipped, Darth's physical defence is 990, which is just about enough to fight Berserkers with.

There was time in the morning for MistressDomina to have another "power hour" in Prokion Temple, though I had to locate some skill boxes and trade them across to her first. Out of ten boxes, I got four platinum super skill pills, two super skill pills, one effort scroll, and three five-packs of skill point boosters, which I thought a pretty good result. MD will use the pssps first, and then use the ssps after that...by that time she'll be in level 32, and so gaining less skill exp per kill.

So, today's pssp-using hour gave MistressDomina 483 skill points, with the entire session giving 486 - there wasn't really any point in staying around without a boost. The experience gain was 22.33%, with MD still set to divert half her experience gain to Norcaine, and her drake added 959 pet points as well. It's great to get her over the 20k mark for unused experience points, though that will fall a bit once she reaches her next level.

There was a general moving around of loot to MistressDomino, my merchant character, which delayed the start of the afternoon fighting, and in the end I decided on something nice and restful - my level seven sorcer LordElpus, fighting foxes and wolves. It was fairly slow going, slowed down further by me not giving things total attention as I had some downloading to do, but eventually I got the 32 skill points I'd started with up to the 65 needed for the fifth and final level of the passive skill Cursed Soul, which increased LordElpus's magic attack from 127 to 137. More skill points will be needed to beef up his summoned fire and earth elementals, but one thing at a time! By the end of the session my sorc was almost halfway through his level.

There was just time for SirDarth to take a pan flute to Lorraine, and then on to Jajan in Dratan, before the early evening food break; Darth took his new pony on to Merac, and his favourite Berserker, and started it on its rather lengthy training regime.

Before long, a Pandora's Box appeared, nudging against our two heroes, practically. As it was so close, to be safe I logged Darth out and Chuck in, but when he opened the box, he only had to take the money, a drop of 20,000 gold. It occurred to me though that I could have just moved one knight safely away in such circumstances, and let the other one open the Box, only calling on Chuck if a level fifty beast was released... so when another Box turned up a few minutes later, that was what I did...and of course this time a Beast was released, so, after making sure to draw it away from where Darth and his pony had retreated to, Peri logged out, and Chuck rode down to the rescue, with the Beast dropping 41,600 gold for him.

For the evening, Kaerella dared to venture into the Tomb of Theos again, though without Rage - it was simpler, and cheaper, just to have a solo party with SirDarth, as he worked on his new pony. I tried a few Screaming Zombies solo; I ought really to do a proper "power hour" or two with a platinum blessed iris, individual experience boosters, a crit potion, and maybe a power potion too, which adds 100 to one's physical attack, and 95 to physical defence, for an hour - and some magic buffs too if one is that type of character! With SirFrancis, my drake, equipped, Kae's physical defence is 1789 at present, but any extra would be welcome, the zombies do hit hard. Kae is well off for the crit type potions (which increase the chance of a critical hit), but only had two power potions in her inventory...so when a special offer was announced for the 5-pack of them, which cost 229 aeria points, so that buying one pack got not just one but two free packs, i couldn't resist.

But somehow the time didn't seem right, there were too many people around, so I just fought normally, aided for a while by a level 36 temple knight called LordAshrum, though at that level he had to fight outside the party. I noticed that he had triggered an experience booster, but to get the benefit of one of those you have to land the killing blow, and a level 36 character, well, just doesn't hit hard enough to kill a zombie, they regenerate health too quickly. We tried, with me getting a zombie or two down low and then wall-hugging, but it didn't work, and after a while he went off to join some guildies in Merac. He was back in the Tomb later in a party with them, I noticed...

My main and official team-up was with the level 60, and later level 61, rogue DAREDEVILRO - whose English wasn't the most fluent I've come across, but I expect the "RO" stands for Romania. She did die a couple of times; you just can't rely on an archer's healing powers down there, a zombie hits about four times as hard as I can heal. The second time was unlucky, we managed to kill our zombie, though DD's health was pretty low - but before I could heal her, she stepped back into a loose zombie that someone else had lured and then been unable to deal with.

Generally DD would lure a Screaming Zombie, or occasionally a level 101 Infected Grey Mummy, which gives slightly more experience, but more importantly moves nice and slowly, though you do have to get past the first zombie spawning area to get to them. To begin with she'd use Snare then, but settled into a routine of keeping that for later, so she'd attack her target, run back, and I'd use Slow Shot on it. Usually it would keep its murderous intent on DD, so that I could keep filling it with arrows..hopefully I could keep Slow Shot active most of the time, so DD could retreat, turn and fire in the traditional manner.

Well, that was the evening session. Kae went up by 27.60%, and SirFrancis added 977 pet points. SirDarth got the new pony up to level eight by the end of the evening, and SirPerivale, who logged on for an hour or so after Kae had finished, got that particular horse past the 50% make in level 31. Kaerella's school uniform cover expired, which wasn't important as she'd not melded it to her armour, and had just worn it a time or two in town; I wonder how long Peri's has left to run? For convenience, it does look as if it would be a good idea to replace the +1 extra it gave his armour pieces with a permanent extra plus, courtesy of lucky smelting stones, so that he can continue to visit the Berserkers when his pet is level 31 or above. Those Butchers back up the hill just die too quickly...