Further Adventures

The pet-levelling plans I had got overtaken by events rather late last night, when FemeiaVraci, the level 33 cleric in the DeathBringers guild that SirPerivale belongs to, contacted Peri and asked him to level up her horse for her, from level 29 to 37. Peri went back to Randol, and traded her horse for his level 24 one, so that she still has a pet to give her buffs; she then changed over to her main DeathBringers character, the level 55 archer Lylja, and traded 350 tool aids across, in three instalments as otherwise Peri would have been just too overweight to accept them.

So, CaptainScarlet went back to Randol too, and traded his level 24 horse across to Peri in exchange for the 29-er, meaning that Peri is back where he was, just about, but Cap has FemeiaVraci's level 29 one to work on, which means that the pink drake was either going to be neglected for a week or so, or passed across to MistressDomina without any further levelling.

The latter choice seemed best, for the time being, so after coffee this morning MistressDomina exchanged her ordinary-colour level 38 drake for the pink one, and then Cap exchanged that one with MistressBlaze for her level 27 one, after which SirDarth traded in his level 25 drake for the one two levels higher, so that everyone was happy.

One priority now seemed to be to get that new would-be pet-leveller of mine, RedRackham, up to level 35. At level 31, he still gets good experience and skill exp in a solo party, so CaptainScarlet was able to continue work on Lylja's horse, while Red went to Prokion Temple in a solo party with him.

Apart from an archer who, seeing Red surrounded by a mob of six or more Orcs, helpfully killed most of them and then left, the morning's session in "my" back room was uneventful. RedRackham ended the session up by 35.46% and 133 skill points; I could go faster by using his "beginner" platinum blessed irises, for 150% more experience gain per hour, but it seems best to wait until he is getting less skill exp before I use those. Depending on how his stock of unused skill points goes, he could always end up teaming with MistressBlaze out with the Sphinx Fighters and Speer Men for the final stretch of getting to level 35, I guess.

When RedRackham was adding CaptainScarlet to his party, I noticed Elvastar, in Prokion Temple, was registered as seeking a party, so I invited him to join - but he must have been afk, as I got no response to that or to a whispered greeting. I assume he moved across to the Cariae server, as planned, later.

At lunchtime Samael got in touch, with a tale of woe. Unwisely he had allowed his younger brother access to that level 33 pale blue horse Peri (and Cap) worked on for him, and the little brat had swapped it for a drake! I had to say that Lylja's horse has priority at the moment, but that I was working on another horse as well, currently level 25, and would be in touch with him when it reached level 33. At least, with heaven stones and that Stone of Shadow, he is more generous with his rewards for pet-levelling labour than most of Peri's guildies....

For the afternoon session, RedRackham went back to Prokion Temple, and in a generally uneventful few hours went up by 42.91%, and 177 skill points. That took him into level 32. On the downside that meant that instead of 17,072 experience & 4,400 skill exp from the Sergeants and 7,702 experience & 3,300 skill exp from the Axemen, he now got 14,227 & 3,850 from the Sergeants, and 5,776 & 2,750 from the Axemen; the Orc Sergeants were no longer white-named, like the Orc Axemen they were now green-named. The upside, however, was that back in Randol he was able to learn all five levels of the Temple Knight passive skill Wall of Belief, increasing his physical defence stat, without a shield equipped, from 800 to 955. That took 327 skill points, so Red ended the day with only 17 less unused skill points than when he began.

SirPerivale joined Cap for a little pet-levelling over the early evening food break, and then went and did some mining, using up a hundred of the tool aids that Lylja had traded across to me, which meant, as pickaxes don't stack, making three trips out to the mine north of Randol. 2,700 quality stones weight less than 100 tool aids, so he's not as close to 100% of his weight allowance now.

That was followed by MistressBlaze and MistressSabina taking another trip out into Dratan's sunny, grassy uplands, where the Sphinx Fighters and Sphinx Speer Men roam. A rogue called MsNatashA was already busy there, daringly taking on the Elite Sphinx Speer Man single-handed. Before too long MistressSabina reached level 38, and was able to go back to town to learn both Decay and HP Drain, for a total of 586 skill points. Decay reduces the enemy's chance of a skill succeeding apparently, while HP Drain removes, at level five (further levels come available at 53 and 63), 230 health points from one's foe, healing one by that amount, which sounds rather useful in some circumstances. Sabina won't be able to learn the skill Blind until level 43, as she doesn't yet have enough stat points in Intelligence. "In PvE, this skill seems to decrease the monster's evasion and thus increases your hit rate" apparently, while in Player versus Player your opponent's screen goes black, and they have to find and re-select you before they can continue their attack.

Soon after MsNatashA left, a level 41 titan called mike000mike arrived, and suggested a party; he didn't mind Sabina just standing at the side offering moral support, so we settled into a routine of killing the Elite, then a couple of the regular types, and so on, though we did get chased by more than one Sphinx type a few times. Sadly we did end with the Elite taking its revenge on Mike, but the team-up did make a nice change from the soloing there. A melee character in that location does really need to team with someone who has a ranged attack, unless he is pretty high level, as running forward to attack one Sphinx type does tend to attract the attention of a few others.

I had a brief glimpse of a sorcerer called H0ll0W, who managed to kill a Sphinx Fighter while in his red demon form, but generally the place was quiet for a while. A little later a rogue called sheila was in action, but she generally kept to the meadow just round the corner, so we didn't overlap.

By the end of the session MistressBlaze had added 26.23%, along with 979 pet points for her level 38 new drake, while MistressSabina had gone up by 64.30%, so that she is now more than halfway through level 38. As the main priority there is to get MB up into level 46, perhaps their next party there should be of the Combat type, with some sort of experience boost for her. I'll have to get her some experience-type boxes to open.

And then it was time for SirPerivale and CaptainScarlet to head back to Merac. Peri should get his horse (or, eventually, Samael's) into level 26 before he logs out tonight, but Cap's horse (or Lylja's) will still be about an hour short of level 32 then. Lylja was hoping that getting her horse to level 37 could be done within a week - somehow I think it may take a bit longer.