There was a slight delay before SirGalahad could swing into Maargadum action this morning, as I needed to move items around between characters on Tairen-1; most importantly, RedRyder traded the +10 30/32 armour set across to her fellow rogue xRAGEx, along with the level 33 +10 crossbow, and indeed the level 29 +4 one, while Rage passed the older armour sets on to a storage rogue character, and recent loot drops got moved to MistressDomino. It all took half an hour or so, but finally Gal was able to be reunited with his favourite death mask lancer, and I was able to get some breakfast.
The morning session didn't start very promptly after coffee, as I needed to make a trip to the post office, but eventually Rage was able to spend every last one of her stash of skill points, and, since RedRyder had passed over some of her supply of quest items, some quests were completed immediately - these included two that called for a visit to Shuraine, so it's handy that I tend to add that location to a character's memory scroll when I pass Shuraine's oasis on the way to Prokion Temple for the first time.
Rage started in the room alongside the "back room" which houses orc soldiers and mummies, but once she reached level 26 and was able to wear the +10 shirt and leggings, the corridor outside that room was more useful, with its mixture of orc soldiers and orc fighters. With just the old armour set, except for the +10 gloves, Rage's physical defence was 436, but moving up to the new shirt and leggings moved the figure on to 603, so even the fighters couldn't do any appreciable damage.
There was just time before lunch to reach level 27, and put on the hood and boots too, which moved the defence stat on to 734. 196.58% experience had been added, probably almost a third of it from quest rewards, and a new stash of 253 more skill points. As RedRyder had traded a drake egg across along with the armour, Rage had been able to start a new hatchling at last, and it had got a third of the way into its second level as well, with its Sympathy reaching 62%.
Towards the end of the lunch break, when I was back at the computer but not yet playing actively, SirGalahad had been invited into a party for a while down in Maargadum Jail by a knight called knightofhonor, which seemed strange until he explained that it was a combat party, so would give him a useful boost; Gal gained 2 skill points from that. Knightofhonor tried a little pet-levelling after he'd finished fighting the soldiers, but unfortunately tried the lancer I was fighting, so it died before long, so he didn't get much out of it. As for me, well, I just had to wait for the lancer to respawn, and was able to continue.
For the main afternoon session, Rage headed back to Prokion Temple. The back room was now available to Rage, with her full +10 armour set, so that's where I went. Before long a mage called Arkantos came in, and lured an orc sergeant to back near the door, where she took ages to get its health down - I had to kill off any other orcs that spawned too near to her. It was all very puzzling, and she left before the sergeant was killed. Later a level 33 or 34 archer called Ariahna charged in, took the central position, and proceeded to dominate the place, which slowed me down rather - quite often we ended up firing our bows at the same orc. I think she must have had a +15 bow, as the place certainly wasn't really big enough for both of us...but we persevered. The situation wasn't helped though when Arkantos returned, this time able to use the Terra Spear skill! Luckily I was approaching level 29 by then, so was able to get to that level, equip the +10 level 33 crossbow, and head out.
The announcement had come up that one of [GM]Valsharyn's "Cluedo" events was coming up on Auzura-4, so my food break got postponed, and Kaerella, who's a level 67 archer in those parts, logged in. No prizes for me this time, but boy was it slow - why Val had a seven-minute gap between each of the three questions I don't know, and the first "clue" each time was so vague that it didn't really help. Somebody who had had a few number one hits in their time? A fairly new star? Someone over 40? Narrowing those down by sex didn't help much either, but finally enough was revealed for people to guess Elton John (after a hint about his penchant for "crazy costumes"), Megan Fox (as the star of a movie that had had a recent sequel), and Jack Nicholson (as someone who had been brought up believing his grandparents were his parents). So, it was all very slow, and rather delayed the food break.
I was back just in time for the Mad Monster Spawn at six, UK time, again hosted by Our Val. I didn't realise that he was running a low-level one as well as the usual one; when I found out, and after a wave of goodies had been spawned and grabbed, I teleported across, but it had finished by then, so I moved straight back. I think RedRider only died once, and as usual was able to use Snare usefully. From the loot grabbed, her inventory weight went up about 25%, but that was probably mainly tool aids.
I did try to ask [GM]Valsharyn about the lack of Asia/Pacific and European time "Happy Hours" on Fridays and Sundays lately, but, to both Kae whispering it to her at the "Cluedo" event and Red asking in the general channel after the MMS, I got no response at all. Maybe it is a taboo subject, I don't know...
After that, well, it was time for another session with Rage in Prokion Temple on Tairen-1. Luckily, the back room was free, though for perhaps the last hour I shared it with an archer called BlackFireHealer, a member of the elite DestructioN guild, who had a polar bear pet, which as far as I could see just followed her around and didn't take any damage, with the lighting in that room making it look more of a brown bear cub than a "poley". She did actually ask if there was room for her too before starting to battle the orcs, which makes a very pleasant change, and there was, just about - though as she was using a full-strength platinum super skill pill and a health stealer, I did occasionally let her take priority when only a single orc had respawned.
She did attempt to sell me two platinum pet pills for three million gold, which is probably a good price, but I don't really need them. I mentioned that I had a pet leveller hard at work on level five of Maargadum even then, with a horse at level 29 - and she told me that she had levelled and sold three pets already, just using her healer, bare-handed, in Merac, presumably on berserkers. I guess that may be how she affords the pssp and health stealer.
I kept going a little beyond my usual finishing time - but then, I "usually" do, it seems. But when Rage reached level 31, that was the time to leave the room to BlackFireHealer, and head back to town. The +10 armour set and pair of rogue weapons arrived safely in my inventory, and Rage had added 200.34% plus 575 skill points, as well as getting her hatchling up another two levels to six. I'd apologised for its behaviour, as it flitted all around the room picking up anything it could, but BlackFireHealer said that was fine, she didn't pick stuff up... a policy she might have changed if the heaven stone that dropped at that point had been from one of her orcs, rather than one of mine.
Back in Randol Rage spent all but 19 of her skill points, and became a ranger, a crossbow-wielder, as my rogues always do. The assassin class, using a pair of daggers for melee combat, is more of a PvP kind of character, and a ranged attack is a lot simpler in PvE. Over in Maargadum Jail, knightofhonor returned around then, for a new combat party. By the end of the evening, SirGalahad's horse will still be an hour or so short of level 30, but with the usual server downtime scheduled for about one o'clock, UK time, the option of leaving him on overnight isn't available.
No comments:
Post a Comment