Meanwhile on Auzura...

SirGalahad made a trip out to Prokion Temple in the morning on Auzura-6, with my archer Kaerella back in Dratan City providing the solo party, and getting a little skill experience for herself (110 skill exp per orc soldier) and boosting Gal's skill exp gain by 5%. By the time SirGalahad got up to 99% of level 23, he'd gained 217 skill points; back in Randol he invested all but 3 of them in special skills, mainly herb processing, and then visited the degraded golien commander in ebony mine to get back, by 34 death penalties, to the start of his level.

After that, it seemed time for MistressDomina to earn a few more skill points, so she formed a party on Auzura-4 with CaptainScarlet. He went to do some pet-levelling on his level 32 drake with a death mask lancer in Maargadum Jail - and she headed for the Tomb of Theos, which, Kaerella had discovered, was on 100% easy.

The hour's session there wasn't perfect, however; it took me a few minutes to remember that giving herself the scud, haste and spell focus buffs helped MistressDomina's fighting speed, and at 10:54 both MistressDomina and CaptainScarlet got disconnected. Once I'd got him back in, Cap just stayed in Randol giving the solo party for the rest of the hour, as taking him back to his death mask lancer would have been difficult while I was concentrating on MD - but my mage raced back to her ancient grey mummies to complete the hour. Losing the connection meant losing the stored-up "ignition" of course, which is always annoying.

Still, MistressDomina managed to use 60 skill point boosters, and gained 329 skill points, as well as 0.79% and 981 pet points, so things weren't too bad. It seemed that the whole game was having lag problems and disconnections - usually if I disconnect it's a few minutes after eleven, not before.

Undismayed, before lunch CaptainScarlet returned to Maargadum Jail, and after lunch MistressDomina went back to the Tomb of Theos, after stocking up on the medium-size mana potions in Strayana. The first hour showed a proper return to form, including an ignition run and in all the use of 76 boosters, for 422 skill points, plus 1.40% and 1073 pet points. The Twisted guild master SacSalop came online fairly briefly, and at my request unfroze MD's experience gain - well, moving through half her current level she'd gained roughly 20k of skill points, so I reckon the job is nearly done. I think Sac had done a web search for his name, as he mentioned that he'd seen the blog.

The second afternoon hour saw another 70 skill point boosters used, for 389 skill points, along with 2.02% experience, since it roughly coincided with dungeon time's 50% boost, and 1064 pet points. Sadly, the lagging-out disconnection bug struck once more during the third hour, again snuffing out a promising ignition boost, but I still managed to get through 72 boosters, which gave me another 394 skill points, plus 1.50% and 1001 pet points. That sort of disconnection does seem to take away some recently earned skill points, though without giving back the boosters they were earned with...

Tuffsen appeared in the shoutbox, declaring that she was feeling lonely in her solo party in the ancient grey mummies room on Cariae-4. I had a nasty moment then, which may have been something to do with the lag problems, which I think some people said were affecting the Aeria website as well as the games. The shoutbox logged me out, so that I couldn't reply, and then when I tried to log back in, I got the red-letter "no such account" notice, which is more usually to do with an account being banned than anything else. I was still busily working on my power hour in-game, so maybe I didn't type something quite right, but still... Luckily the next attempt did log me back in, and I was able to assure Tuffy that, after the early evening food break, I'd be able to join her. After all, the Auzura room tends to get a bit crowded, particularly in the evenings, so there was no point in trying any more sp-farming hours on Auzura today...especially with the disconnection threat.

RedRydeR and Kaerella had actually earned a little more experience last night after the blog went, as they say, "live" (or something) - for Red another 1.45%, 7 skill points, and 806 pet points, in fact, with Kae getting another 0.38% and 10 skill points, plus her polar bear cub reaching level 6.

Anyway, Kae and Red logged in, and I managed to contact BadFairy (Tuffsen's specialist sorcerer), and get a free Recall to the Tomb... NaOmi joined us soon afterwards. Tuffy was in a different party, a solo one, once she'd got us in. RedRydeR started fighting immediately, while, as I still had some internet and email stuff to take care of, Kae's contribution was, for a while, limited to supplying her buffs.

The evening passed in the Tomb there. NaOmi logged out at a reasonable time, and an early-rising Australian, Fartimaeus, a level 99 specialist sorcerer in the Mythic guild, soon arrived, asked if there was room for him, and joined the combat party in her stead. BadFairy decided to join the combat party halfway through the evening, and keep her solo sp-farming more for level 103. Tuffsen and I were both a little bit active in the forum shoutbox - as I happened to help someone at a rather busy time the GameSage Giovanna_X sent me a short personal message to thank me, and to say she'd given me karma, which was a nice gesture.

I decided against doing an experience-based "power hour" with Kaerella from eight to nine as the room was fairly busy, and really she is more in need of skill points than swift levelling up now. By the time the end of the evening was approaching, she'd added 4.37%, more importantly 59 skill points, and 3,937 pet points, with her polar bear cub well into level eight from a couple of appearances, while RedRydeR was up by 9.82%, the same 59 skill points, and 5,453 pet points.