The Forgotten Temple

The pet-levelling began at breakfast time, and continued throughout the day - though there wasn't an opportunity to go overnight, again, as an "emergency maintenance" was announced in the evening, to start at 11:00pm UK time. Still, by then the pale blue horse should be well past 80% of the way through level 33, so the progress continues.

I was busy downstairs today, so the only other thing I was able to do was some herb-gathering and mining, also on Katar, with Kaerella and then with RedRyder. One can never have too many quality stones - or at least any surplus can be passed either to ColonelScarlet for his pet-levelling duties, or to MistressDomino to sell to people too lazy to do their own mining.

So, it was the early evening before any action was to be had, and that just involved RedRyder going out to Prokion Temple on Katar-1, and its orc soldiers and mummies, after getting the Elizabeth's Enhancement buff of course. I didn't count up the number of skill points I wanted quite correctly, and found that the 150total I'd managed to get was 1 short, if I wanted to get a level of zeta wave processing as well as the first five levels of Alchemy, so quickly rode out of Randol to kill a couple of blood wolves and their elder werewolf companions, until the extra point clicked up.

The reason that was a short session was that the next "epic event" was due to start at six o'clock on Auzura. Yesterday's "Crashing Tide" was to be followed by "The Evil Shroud". Without checking through old blog entires I'd forgotten what the location for the adventure would be - which was appropriate, as the Forgotten Temple, or Temple of Forgetfulness, was where the summoned teleporter NPCs took us, from outside Randol's north gate..

After yesterday's setback, I played it safe and just logged my level 31 healer Memree in on Auzura-4, and joined the merry throng. The local types of monster, at around level 70, were enough to kill me rather swiftly, without the assistance of the visiting flutons, patriarch botises, cube guards of many different shapes and sizes, and many more, so care had to be taken - and when I did get killed, the runs back were a bit dangerous, particularly trying to get past the legendary slayers. I was in a party with, among others, the level 56 archer kukli4kataBG again, and got to use Resurrection a time or two, though some people automatically respawn back at the start - and one or two just left. Colbud2, a level 30 knight, was the other one to stay around until the end

Auzura didn't do too well, in that we didn't get beyond the first of the two main boss rooms; it is just a matter of how many people attend an event like this, and how many of them are high level. Still, we got a fair way towards clearing that area out, at least, and our goodies were spawned in the middle, where I was able to grab some, even though various cube guards, reinforced troll kings, and other bad guys were perilously close.

Next, at seven, came Katar, so RedRyder had her turn with the monsters. Of the three servers I was on, Katar did best, and I'd say we succeeded, in that we were in the final room when the hour was up. The reprise-events are billed as "fight alongside [GM]Beatrice", but I can't say that I saw her around; Auzura and Katar seemed to be hosted by [GM]Kali, at least she was the only GM there I noticed. Of course, Beatrice has the distinction of being a fictitious GM...who actually plays her, I wonder? I hope it is always the same person, as otherwise account-sharing could lead to a ban, heheh...

The runs back were pretty perilous again. I'd go outside the Temple and get horse buffs, to increase my defence, but still I'd sometimes get killed along the way, and have to try again. Towards the end I thought to use Snare on the first two legendary slayers, always hard to get past and deadly with their ranged magical attack, but it doesn't work every time. In the final room, I died once again - and just then the hands of loot were spawned, so I was feeling a bit annoyed with things when I respawned back at the start, and triggered a health potion to get my health back up. I moved... and discovered that I was under the "double death" bug I've mentioned recently, and I was suddenly respawned next to the loot. So, for once a bug worked very much in my favour, and I was able to pick up plenty of goodies.

I decided not to risk Barbarienne or Keerella on Cariae, with all those flutons and patriarch botises involved, so it was my level 27 rogue Karella who picked up the gauntlet. At least she is a slight improvement on RedRyder in that she wears the whole of the +10 30/32 armour set, not just the gloves, but that difference in physical defence doesn't mean much to a Performer Bereed.

This time [GM]Krash was in charge, and unlike Kali, he did get involved - it certainly helps to have a level 165 tank at the front of the attack! I noticed he remarked at one stage "Wow my pots didn't work, at all. Lame" - so hopefully he'll be giving some feedback on that to the developers. "Join the club, Krash", Quqleque commented.

We got very nearly to the end boss room, a place where in quieter times Rage has been known to go for an sp-farming session. But time ran out for us, so the loot was spawned a bit short of there. I discovered that Karella's inventory was actually full, and I had to get rid of a personal dungeon ticket before I could pick up item drop boosters, so didn't pick up quite as much as I might have hoped, but there seemed plenty of stuff to go around, as of course not every player who'd started the event had got that far.

Krash left us the remaining monsters to play with, so we continued fighting for a while - the next time I got killed, though, the run back seemed not worth attempting, so Karella logged out.

And that was the end of the excitements. Checking back over the old blog entries, I see that the next event on the list, for tomorrow, should be defending Randol, on a PvP-enabled subserver, which isn't as exotic or different as invading more distant parts of the world. Beatrice ought to put in an appearance then, or things won't be the same at all. After that we move on to Juno's Velpist Temple, followed by attempting to reassemble Beatrice's soul in Prokion Temple, so there will be more outings for RedRyder and Karella yet. Perhaps RedRider on Auzura could make it a rogue-style triple-act? The Snare skill certainly comes in useful on these occasions. These repeat adventures were a nice idea, and make a change from storming castles, or battling mad monster spawns, but they don't seem to be attracting quite as many people as they did originally. All the more loot for those of us who do turn up, then.