A Quieter Day

With the regular weekly server maintenance last night, there was no opportunity for overnight pet-levelling, so it was just before breakfast when CaptainScarlet and RedRackham were able to restart their endeavours. It didn't take too long for Samael's horse to reach level 33 - now I just need Samael and Lylja to appear to claim their mounts, which now are just taking up space as far as I'm concerned. Each time SirPerivale logs on, the DeathBringers guild is entirely quiet.

I didn't have a full hour to play uninterrupted after coffee, but XxGALAHADxX and Enchantrella did head for Prokion Temple on Cariae-3 again, after Enchantrella had exchanged her +6 armour set for a +10 one. A healer of mine, LadyAuzura, had earned a +10 set the same way Gal did, so this was the set Enchie gained - she had to convert it into the mage equivalent at Collector Ryu of course. Back in my old Cariae-playing days, a +6 set was all one needed, but times are more dangerous now.

By lunchtime, Galahad had added 11.61%, 42 skill points and 131 guild points, while Enchantrella was 3.52% up, plus 43 skill points and 16 guild points. I left them there over lunch, and continued afterwards, using the last of Gal's beginner-type pssps for an hour. I wasn't playing 100% flat out then, though, so it was just 116 skill points he gained then, going up 12.65% while Enchantrella added 3.83%. The whole afternoon session there added 30.38% for Gal, plus 196 skill points and 343 guild points for ForceWithin; Enchie added 18.18%, 126 skill points, and 113 guild points for Norcaine. About halfway through the session the newer computer had a "run out of memory" crash, and after that the party was Equal rather than Combat, which is why Enchantrella's experience gain for the afternoon was a bit higher. But we do need to get her to level 29, at least, before too long.

LadyAuzura had also been looking after my level 51 Scra-Chi cartoon cat-like pet SkrappY, so Enchie took him as well, and equipped him while in the Temple; unlike ordinary pets, any party experience will give them their equivalent of pet points, their actual owner doesn't have to do the killing, so some progress through level 51 was made. Being so many levels above Enchantrella, though, meant that SkrappY did tend to get hungry rather quickly, so it was an expensive undertaking.

The next item on the agenda was to do a little work back on Auzura-4 on LadyJane, my level 5 healer, so, as a relaxing change of pace, she went out and killed some foxes and wolves. A rogue called Asif did attempt to trade with me, she was offering me, as obviously a new player, some gold, which was a very kind thought, though I had to say that LadyJane wasn't my first character, so I should be okay.

Once LadyJane had reached level 7, it was time for the run out to Prokion Temple. She hadn't picked up any small health potions, so I had to buy a couple, before setting out. As usual getting past the clever foxes and the sand golems was a close thing, even using a health potion, with LJ in her starter armour, but she succeeded, and got Shuraine's oasis onto her scroll, and then ran on to the Temple, with her potion of haste running out just as she approached the finish line. She even went inside, and managed to pick up a few unwanted gold drops that were only a yard or two into the corridors leading off the safety of the lobby.

Kaerella had by that time traded her drake SirFrancis, then on 7,132 pet points out of 11,237 through level 34, to RedRackham, taking the drake he'd been working on, now level 27, in his place, temporarily - and I'd traded across a blue pan flute from storage to SirPerivale, who did the quest of taking it to Lorraine in Randol, and then on to Jajan in Dratan, to get a cute little pale blue level 1 pony. Peri also went out to Prokion Temple to get rid of the 43.24% experience he'd got in level 22, by letting the Orcs there kill him fifteen times. As usual he picked up some unwanted loot, and gave a few people the Divine Shield armour buff, while he was about it.

The evening session was one of my early-finish Wednesday types, but there was just time for LadyJane and SirPerivale to team up in Prokion Temple. I noticed, when Peri killed his first couple of Ghouls in the corridor leading to one of the octagonal rooms on the way towards the central staircases, that even with LJ in the safety of the lobby, she still got her share of the experience from the kills. But she cautiously moved into the danger area, with Peri clearing the way, and moved to a safe spot just short of that first room.

I would have stayed for at least one more level if I'd had the time, but LadyJane moved successfully from level 7 to level 17 during that session, also adding 41 skill points. And this time I remembered to get my new character a Guardian - so LJ will get the "event" bow when she reaches level twenty, and Kaerella will get 10 Reputation points, which will take her total up to 190.

Ratel had got in touch while I was there, asking first for a bit of advice, which had nothing to do with Last Chaos, but is I suppose worth mentioning just as a general warning. His wife had received an email telling her that she had won a FIFA 2010 lottery prize, which was a lot of money - though for administrative expenses and taxes, she would need to forward the sum of £330 to a London address first. My first reaction was the cliche "if it seems to be too good to be true, it probably is". Ratel gave me the name of the London firm involved, and I did a Google web search for it - and the only result was headlined "419 Scam/Fake Lottery". "419" being the number of the article in the Nigerian penal code referring to that sort of deception.

So, it is good that Ratel and his wife are cautious, and felt that something was wrong and needed to be investigated. You can easily imagine some other people, probably without a large amount in the bank, to whom the sum held out to them would be a truly life-changing, magic event. They'd scrape together the money they were asked for, and send it off - only to be told that there were further expenses to be met, and if they sent more, yet further. The glittering prize would remain forever just out of reach, and the poor "prize-winners" might well sink themselves and their family deeply into debt. It's such an evil, heartless crime. Just remember, never send off cash, particularly by wire transfer, for "winnings", and don't give your bank details to widows of South American dictators who want to send tens of millions of dollars out of their country via your bank account, for which they'd "give" you 10% of the money involved.

Where was I? Ah yes. Ratel also mentioned that he'd managed to get together another 27,500,000 of Last Chaos gold to repay me for the loan to get that +15 weapon, so he is doing very well on that side. He first of all assumed that Peri was in Merac with the Berserkers, and then found that he'd removed Prokion Temple from his memory scroll... by the time I thought to offer to return to town for the exchange, he'd reached Prokion though, and passed the cash over. He mentioned that he has bought a new router for his broadband connection, which may well mean that he will be able to connect more than one computer to the internet at the same time, opening up the possibility of having his wife's account at the Sunday Quiz as well as his own, having a merchant on Auzura-1 while also fighting Bogles at the same time, or even doing a bit of pet-levelling as well as fighting.

I remember someone I knew, who perhaps ought not to be named, having a "conga line" of four characters at the Quiz, using every available computer in the household. Getting sixty heaven stones per week that way, if none of the computers crashed, must have been very handy.

RedRackham at least was able to continue levelling SirFrancis the drake through the rest of the evening, so that level 35 was reached at around eleven; Peri started work on that new blue pony later on, and it looks as if it should reach level 3 by log-out time, though its Sympathy willl take a while to reach 100%.