The Sighting of the Succubus

If it's Wednesday, there must be a new post-maintenance patch, goes the theory. And there was indeed a patch, though a very small one. A stability issue with the new succubus pet/companion has been sorted out, apparently, and bugs with a couple of night shadow and titan skills have been fixed. Due to the high demand for Akan Temple raid parties, as they are the only way to get skill books for the new "soul of" skills each class has gained, very sensibly the raids will now be reset daily, we are told - and the Facebook link for getting one of your characters a pair of sunglasses is back. There is still no news of a return to a full web item mall, though, and the police costumes announced as "here" last week are still not available. This also applies to an item necessary if you want to change a character's appearance, and cards to summon a mercenary assistant.

My team put in their half hour appearances safely. Jamam got in touch with Rage, having decided to join Twisted if we'll have him; I mentioned this in guild chat and Ridlick revealed that he was the one who'd been levelling him for the last day or two. At level 80 now, apparently Jamam still finds that the outdoor level 63 sphinx fighters give good drops, which is surprising; he showed me a level 85 +14 titan sword he was going to buy, having talked its seller down from 500 to 320 million, which, as a green-named, five-seal weapon with a couple of useful gems, looked like a bargain to me.

As far as I could tell, Cariae didn't get a crash this morning, and there was no disconnection on Auzura either, which made a pleasant change. I'd waited so long, expecting a disconnection, that Rage and Kaerella were a bit late entering the Tomb of Theos on Auzura-4 - and that first corner after the spear man room was already being used. The third corner, though, was free - and it has a slight advantage in that its three anubis spear man spawn points are a little closer together, and closer to the corner. A bigger disadvantage, however, is that the aggressive, pet-attacking sphinx fighters also spawn closer in, sometimes right in the corner. MrChuckNorris then logged in, replacing CaptainScarlet, and hurried to join them. The more people there are in a combat party, the bigger the experience boost.

After a few minutes, Kaerella had to unequip her drake, as it was taking too much damage from sphinx fighters spawning right on top of her. She managed to get through the fifty fighters needed for the "15 Years of Lost Memories" quest, but for a fair amount of the time was not fighting, but waiting to target the next fighter to respawn and head straight for Rage. It's a useful spot, certainly, but if you want to concentrate on killing spear men, you definitely need someone else on hand to deal with the fighters. Or maybe you could just ignore them if your armour was good enough, but you'd not be able to have your pet equipped.

Thanks to Kae's fighter-killing, Rage was able to kill 62 anubis spear men during her power hour, adding 32.13% experience, 5 skill points, and 1025 pet points; the whole session was only slightly more, at 32.27%. Kaerella got 1.31%, the 5 skill points, and 333 pet points, while Chuck added 0.76% and, due to his slightly late arrival, 3 skill points.

My trio ran across to the ancient grey mummies room as a "safe haven" over lunch, but then returned to the spear man side as soon as I was back, rather than fighting the mummies for a while, to make sure I was able to take possession of the first corner, for the two to three o'clock dungeon time. They settled in there in the usual way, waiting for the hour to start - and it all went pretty smoothly, without too many sphinx fighters getting involved. Kaerella is still useful there to clear fighters away from around the third spear man, a little further along, but it was much less hectic than the other corner. Again, 62 boosters were used by Rage, and this time 32.26% was the experience gained, along with 4 skill points.

My trio headed straight across to the ancient grey mummies after that, though the main room there was pretty busy; we set up in the corridor instead with, come to think of it, Rage based at its first corner. Nothing there is aggressive, so things were simple enough, and we continued for around an hour, long enough for Kaerella to reach her red ignition run again, for about 90 seconds of speedy killing and extra skill exp. Luckily one of the main room's inhabitants had left by then, so there were a few spare mummies in there for her to target.

For the whole afternoon, Rage's total experience rose to 33.92%, plus 14 skill points and 2738 pet points; Kaerella earned 2.75%, 25 skill points and 1591 pet points, while Chuck added 1.45% and 14 skill points. There seemed to be a guild party for Akan Temple forming up when I logged out, but those raids take a while, and I had dishes to wash, and food to prepare. CaptainScarlet headed for Maargadum Jail again, and was soon past the 80% mark in his drake's 48th level.

For the evening, MistressSabina went out to the giants again, and managed to get another 30.4 million in gold from a not very long session. RedRackham went to Maargadum Jail, providing the solo party on Auzura-6. A specialist sorcerer called 1REAPER1 arrived in the Dratan desert before very long, but generally didn't kill very quickly so there was room for both of us. On one return to sell my loot to the NPC merchant, just as I'd reached ignition again, I saw he was there too, so, thinking that was rather convenient, I quickly buffed up, teleported back, and started the ignition run - only to find, after a couple of kills, that Kamira was there! I finished the ignition run, and then, to ensure that she didn't vanish too quickly, gave her a quick attack... her response took almost half Sabina's health, but I was able to mount up and use "pet return to village" safely.

MistressSabina logged out, and Kaerella logged in, quickly selling a few armour drops to make some room in her inventory. She teleported to Dratan, rode out to the giants, gave herself horse buffs and fast bow fixing, and soon dealt with Kammy, though she did lose 25% or so of her health to the fiery flame field that Kamira projects. The loot didn't include any rare accessory, but as usual the lucky scrolls, crystal of experience (greater), moonstones, and other minor items are very welcome.

MistressSabina had just added 11.62% by then, helped along by a little "Turbo" boost to experience gain, plus 72 skill points and 778 pet points. As often happens on a Wednesday, I needed to log out early... I did log Rage in briefly to ask in guild chat if anyone wanted a "sitter" in a combat party for the eight to nine o'clock dungeon time, but very few Twisted guildies were online, and the only responder, Ridlick, thought I was asking for sitters, and kindly volunteered... so that didn't lead anywhere.

Someone in Dratan had managed to level up their "strange bat" pet to mount status, and had it equipped in Dratan, where MistressSabina saw it whenever she returned to sell her loot. Just as the strange bat looks like a slightly different drake, but flying lower and visible in towns, the mount looks much like a misshapen dragon - but when it isn't being used as a mount, it appears as the sexy succubus - this particular one had taken the name Vampirella, but the comics heroine of that name wears rather more clothing, this succubus's scrap of cloth barely stretched up to cover her nipples, and was remarkably scanty lower down. I thought this was a PG-13 game?

RedRackham continued his work levelling his pale pink drake; he got it to level 23 before too long, and a fair way through that level by the end of the evening, although a passing knight did kill his lancer once. CaptainScarlet, meanwhile, kept working in Auzura-4's Jail, and by the time he logged out, had got his drake to within a couple of hours of level 49.