Sunday 6 June 2010

The Ghost in the Machine


The pet-levelling began for RedRackham at breakfast time, and it wasn't long before the drake reached level 30. He had the gnoll lancer spot in Merac on Cariae-4 to himself, the mages HoneyBun and KiaOra must be taking some time off.

After coffee, RedRydeR and SirKit logged on, and, once Kit had got the level 45 crossbow and had it converted into dual swords, went out to the sphinx types, and the less obvious of the two elite sphinx speer men. Things ran smoothly, and, with the equal party, SirKit levelled up again - RedRydeR's drake levelled up too, reaching 39. RedRyder added 46.59%, and 987 pet points, while SirKit went up by 112.88%. And they each got a couple of skill points, too...

There was just time before lunch, after RedRackham went back to his drake-levelling, for MistressDomina to do a little shopping on Cariae-4. And this time she found one item on her shopping list - Antistune Jarinom Armor +15, a nice new jacket for Barbarienne. It was being sold, via Roy, by SoutherNComforT for 900 million, which didn't seem unreasonable as it was blue-named and had the proper five evasion seals, and was +15 - it also had "decrease limit of apparel level: -3", which means that Barb can wear it right away, or indeed could have worn it two levels ago. Rather useful! That was certainly one of the top four items on my shopping list, along with +15 mage gloves, a new bow for Barb, and, over on Auzura, a level 85 +15 bow for Kaerella there.

After lunch, it didn't take RedRydeR long to kill enough beast leaders, or beast crawlers, on level five of Maargadum Jail to finish her quest - her horse buff was still running when she teleported back to town. 2.95 million experience was the reward for that, which, doubled by the Elizabuff, moved her on by 3.40%; in all she went up 3.64% and 6 skill points. RedRackham had moved across to Cariae-5 to provide the solo party. SirKit checked for new quests, but despite levelling up this morning couldn't find any; one thing he did do, though, was convert his old level 37 dual swords into a single sword, for 180,000 gold, as to use Shield Bash to stun the elite sphinx speer man he has to equip a shield, which means he can't conveniently use his dual swords to help with the attack.

Recently got loot was transferred to MistressDomina, who traded the healer jacket and leggings she'd bought recently across to Barbarienne, who gave her in return the level 85 +15 healer gloves, and level 86 +15 healer jacket, which Barb no longer needs to wear, which MD then traded across to Kaerella - and received their +13 equivalents instead which, I guess, we can try to sell at some point. Kae can't wear the 85/87 set yet, but at least she is suitably prepared.

RedRydeR and SirKit's afternoon session with the sphinx types wasn't a marathon, but they both managed to level up. For the first hour, Red used a platinum adrenaline potion, to speed up her attack, which was useful, but for the rest of the time we were just proceeding as usual. An archer from the EternalDawn guild, AngelofSilence, arrived soon after us, and, moving a little further down the road, managed to get the elite almost every time, which was mildly annoying, but she left after half an hour or so - when she returned later she moved along the other way, and soon vanished. By the end RedRydeR had earned 48.91%, to reach level 50, plus 1030 pet points, while Kit was up by 99.15%, and safely into level 44. They got 4 skill points each; as they level up, the skill exp per kill there will increase.

RedRydeR checked Merac, and found a new quest, which just involved another trip to level five of Maargadum Jail, this time to fight the death mask lancers and death mask soldiers. Back in Randol the Master Rogue had a new passive skill for her to learn - Critical Increase, which for 573 skill points (for the first five levels, there's another when she reaches 80, then 108 and three more) increases her critical rate by 75, from 390 to 465 - the more times she scores a critical hit, for double damage, the better.

After the food break, SirKit's search for new quests came up blank, but RedRydeR was able to do the Jail quest quickly enough - not only did Merac's archbishop give her a reward, he sent her on to Healer Yabo, who also rewarded her, so that between them they gave 4.53%, 6 skill points, and 100,000 gold...the entire outing brought 4.75% and 9 skill points. Red also got the quest to kill the Death Knight, from Patrol Guard Noa, but it would take more than 3,920,000 experience and 3 skill points to get me to fight the big boss in the Jail's final room - his magic attack hits hard, and he isn't fighting solo, either.

With RedRackham over on Cariae-5 to supply the solo party, AmityBlaise had a busy evening in Prokion Temple, in the "mirror" corridor room fighting the orc fighters and single orc axeman. The place was pretty busy, but I had very few passers-by as that is a quiet section, since most approaches are guarded by orc sergeants. By the time the Sunday Quiz was approaching, Amy had gone up by 70.13%, moving into level 30 - she had also earned 570 skill points, as well as 300 guild points. Unless SirKit has a need for a lower-level party companion at some point, once Amy gets to level 31, and is awarded her own +10 armour and weapons set, so that she can return the other set to Karella, any further advancement will be a pretty low priority, but at least she has some spare skill points now.

The GMs in charge of the Sunday Quiz started well, with a warning at 7:15 UK time that the Quiz Room doors would be opening in 45 minutes, which would be 30 minutes before the actual Quiz start. Things went downhill from there, though. I actually left things a little later than I usually do, to allow RedRackham to get his drake into level 31, but when he and Amy logged out, and I restarted Last Chaos on both computers, there was still over ten minutes left... and MistressDomino, when she logged in on Auzura-2, found a rather large mob around the domain merchant, as the doors had not yet been opened. I checked the forum shoutbox, and MD was able to announce that [GM]Cara was just about to open the doors, finally.

It took two or three minutes, but at last we were able to get in. The quiz itself began on time, after a warning that it was about to begin - the only problem was that question three asked us whether or not [GM]Krash was in charge of the "Pharaoh's Treasure" event. On Auzura-2 we were a canny crowd, and almost everyone voted "yes", as that has always been the correct answer in the past. Krash may have left Aeria Games a month or two back, but they'd hardly keep the question in but change the answer.

A lot of other Quiz Rooms had gone for the other option, though, and, after MD and Kaerella had successfully completed the quiz, and got their prizes, the forum shoutbox was pretty busy with complaints. [GM]Cara was there, though, and announced that anyone who had not completed the quiz because of the Krash question should fill out a "request tracker" application, and would get their heaven stones. She announced that in-game, too.

The last time the Krash question appeared, the GMs promised faithfully that it would be removed, so this was really their only option - repeating the quiz too often gets glitched, with no prizes actually appearing. Still, it means an awful lot of extra work for the game masters. I'm not entirely sure, but I think it may have been [GM]Ozymandias who made the promise to remove the Krash question. Honestly, sometimes I gaze upon his works and despair...

For a change, I switched across to the Katar server after the Quiz; ColonelScarlet provided the solo party bonus while doing a little work on his level 39 pink drake, but his minimum hit is 20, so the gnoll lancer's health did go down a bit. I think he needs to boost his "evil" rating by a couple of kills. On Katar Kaerella is level 32, with quite a good stash of skill points, so she went out to Prokion Temple, to the same room AmityBlaise had been in on Cariae-5, and fought the orc fighters and axeman for about an hour, just long enough to get 100 more skill points. That also got 25 guild points for the local branch of Discipline, and increased her experience by just 3.67%.

The "Race to the Finish" event was on Cariae at 10:30, so SirKit, as a pretty speedy character, went along to that. When I asked her, Cara confirmed that this was her last day with our game, so there were many farewells etc. It wasn't just a simple race from the north gate to the west gate, as advertised - instead we were told to "race to the entrance to ebony mine", and then to various other locations, including the west gate, velpist temple, hunter dranore, and berbank mill, before ending up at the north gate again. At each location Cara spawned the usual loot,; I wasn't always in time to pick up anything, but, as well as tool aids and the small HP and MP recovery pots, I did end up with 7 large defence potions, 9 large attack potions, 5 item drop boosters, and 2 skill point boosters. And it would have been a shame to miss [GM]Cara's final event.

It was getting late. but Kaerella on Sarissa logged on for the racing at 11:00pm, and had the advantage of a Juno NPC scroll to get her to some of the locations quickly...something higher-level characters don't have. But that was my lot, for the main computer - RedRackham on Cariae-4 had started to move his drake on through level 31 on the older computer, when last seen.

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