Thursday 20 August 2009

Another Maintenance Break

I let SirPerivale stay up overnight to pet-level, and he made a good job of it. CaptainScarlet joined him before breakfast, and some useful progress was made - as I was busy downstairs all day, more progress than I'd have liked, really. Ah well, the frequent trips up the stairs to check that all was well, and feed the pets, make wonderful exercise I'm sure.

The evening session started on time, anyway; JohnWellington got a more up-to-date armour set from the sorcerer supplies that LordElpus was carrying, trading back his old items, and then checked out the latest quests to come available, both in Randol and in Dratan. There were a few messages to take between characters, including a trip to Shuraine out at his oasis - which, as John had got that spot on his memory scroll, was very quick to do. Without any fighting or having to supply any quest items, 17% experience got added.

Once that was done, John and MistressBlaze teamed up, and headed for the Auzura-3 version of Prokion Temple - where the back room was ready, waiting, and empty. Unless you count the Orc Sergeants and Orc Axemen, that is...

Unfortunately, the Last Chaos log-in news screen had mentioned that the servers would be coming down at noon PST, or eight in the evening, UK time, so the Orc-bashing session couldn't be quite the marathon that would have been ideal. In fact, the in-game announcement came up at 7:30 that the downtime would begin in twenty minutes - I think it was a little longer than that before we got the "two minutes - log out now!" message, but that did bring a halt to proceedings.

Well, MistressBlaze had done some good work by then, and added 13.98%, 149 skill points, and 302 guild points for the Discipline guild. JohnWellington had got the same number of skill points, and as he's on a 50% experience freeze now he contributed 222 guild points, er, too. His experience went up by roughly 114%, so he's well into level 25 now. Which means he could get some new skills, I suppose, but the main thing is to save skill points for the level thirty general skill, which has to be maximised before you are allowed, at level 31, to choose a second profession. And then there are the first skills for a specialist sorcerer to be learnt, when level 32 is reached...

JohnWellington has never ever conjured up his earth elemental, or his fire elemental, although he did learn the first level skills for doing so as they don't cost any skill points - he basically just used his starter weapon to get to level eight, and since then has been letting his team-mates do all the work. He'll never be a great sorcerer, but MistressBlaze does need a party member of his kind of level if she is to gain some more skill points before leaving Prokion Temple, and it ought to be fun to try out his transformation skills when he becomes a specialist. And another +10 armour set can't hurt.

The Last Chaos website was apparently supposed to go offline when the game servers went down - while most of the other Aeria games were offline for a while too, apparently. However, the forum area kept online, and the shoutbox - GM Kali was there for the whole downtime, I think, and people, me included, were wishing her good luck for her battles with GM Stratos, which were scheduled to begin a little later.

After more like an hour than the thirty minutes originally announced, the servers went back up - CaptainScarlet logged straight in, clicked on to the animal trainer to use a pet skill point, and then headed for Merac, and started pet-levelling... only to be disconnected after a few seconds of Berserker-bashing. The server status changed to "maintenance" again, but this time it was only a minute or two before things were back in action. Auzura's "false start" seemed to be rolled back, at least Cap had to "spend" that pet skill point again...

MistressDomina, in a solo party with Cap, headed for the Shinx types, for a relatively brief session before log-out time. The archer Francesca001 was also there, and dared to kill the Elite Sphinx Speer Man a few times, but I just kept busy with the Sphinx Fighters and Sphinx Speer Men, whichever happened to be handy. In all MD managed to add 6.38% experience, 2 skill points, and 226 pet points. Well, I did say the session was relatively brief...

Battles between guild masters Kali, an archer, and Stratos, a highlander type titan, were scheduled to begin at 10:00pm UK time, moving from server to server but starting on Auzura-1 in Randol's arena. MistressDomina hopped over there, and added her "Go Kali! <3" merchant-style sign to a few others already displayed. There was quite a crowd, though some people tended to rush into the arena, despite being asked not to.

It was possible to "bet" on the outcome, by buying a small package in either Kali's or Stratos's name from the web item mall...and the package would give you a pair of heaven stones, as well as the ten experience boosters it initially supplied, if "your" GM won. But 199 ap for just that didn't seem very good value to me.

The battles themselves weren't hugely exciting to watch, but Kali won, which was the main thing. Those people who went into the arena then were treated to a bunch of purple dragons falling on their heads, and a Fluton or two, but it was time for MD to log out, so that SirPerivale could join CaptainScarlet for a little late night pet-levelling.

All the pet-levelling time today means that, by log-out time, Cap's horse will be fairly close to reaching level 34, while Peri's drake has started on level 24 now. So, both pets are a bit too high-level to be kept busy overnight... which at least means that I'll save a bit of electricity, if both computers are switched off.

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