Steady Progress

It had crossed my mind yesterday to have a small grumble about the unusual timing of the main sequence of "Storm the Castle" events; the website calendar had got them starting at midnight, UK time, for Cariae and Katar, followed by Hatzring and Sarissa at 00:30, with Auzura bringing up the rear at 1:00am for the UK, or 2:00am for most of Europe - and Auzura of course is meant to be the server that times its events for European players.

However, just as I was about to vanish for a nice mug of hot chocolate, at about two minutes to eleven, I saw on SirGalahad's screen an announcement that the events had been brought forward by an hour, which meant that Cariae and Katar's events were about to start. Without stopping to think, really, I logged in my level 31 rogue Memree on Katar. I could have gone with my level 101 archer Barbarienne on Cariae for a change, but my usual feeling is that I need the loot more on Katar...

The event had just started when I teleported in, and people had cleared the initial bridge, and were at the gateway into the main courtyard fighting the zamaras and anubis spear men, so Memree quickly joined the fighting, using Snare. We got into the courtyard, and set to work clearing out the remaining anubis spear men, hell-otuu, dark harpies, and so on - and in about ten minutes, Merac Castle had been purged of its unwelcome inhabitants.

[GM]JediMike's events may be short, but he always comes through for us with generous amounts of loot, spawned back outside, so I grabbed my share, and by a quarter past was able to log out. Still, while I got on with the hot chocolate and other preparations for bed, I couldn't help thinking that, while I couldn't really contribute much on Hatzring or Sarissa, it wouldn't be too awfully late a night if I turned up on Auzura-4 at midnight for a few minutes.

So, just about ready for bed, I was back at the keyboard as midnight approached, with my level 73 rogue Rage ready outside Merac Castle on Auzura-4. "Are you guys ready?" JediMike asked, and when answered in the affirmative, the event began.

Rage started off by tanking a swarm of male assassinbugs; they may be green-named to her, at level 70, but it was quite a swarm, so I used a couple of health potions, and was glad of some assistance. Then there were the thorny mantises from Strayana (level 113), death knights, baals, jumping devils - and then the gateway defended by the zamaras and spear men, by which time our proper tanks were in action, and I was more providing artillery damage and Snares.

The attack was successfully over by a quarter past, and once again [GM]JediMike was extremely generous with the loot outside...and then it was time for me to log out.

I did however leave SirGalahad in action overnight, since he seemed to be doing well and hadn't been disturbed for a while. He did okay, taking the horse on well until probably about six, when he got a disconnection. He was back in action from breakfast time, though, passing legendarynoob fighting beast flyers on level three as Gal ran to his favourite death mask lancer. All that work meant that excellent progress had been made through level 36.

Legendarynoob came down a little later and started to pet-level on the same lancer, which was a bit noob-ish; I think he went afk then, I had to break aggro and move off to attack a different lancer or he'd have been left standing doing nothing when the one lancer died.

My Discipline guildie Gamer was online during the morning; she soon reached level 27, and was asking what the best way was to earn money. With her minimal command of English, it was difficult, but I gave her the link to the website page for the next Sunday Quiz. When I checked the guild list a little later, to see if she had moved from Juno to Prokion Temple, I saw that she was actually visiting Maargadum Jail, which isn't a very hospitable place for someone that level.

Gamer's 50% experience gain cap was helping the Discipline supply of guild points to grow rather nicely, so that at last we had enough points for the 0th level of "expension of the guild", for 2000 guild points and 200,000 gold. That got the maximum number of members up to 35, which I'm sure is more than enough - the next item on the agenda would be to get the guild from level 6 to 7.

I decided that I really ought to help Gamer, it is after all pretty brave to play a game in a language you don't follow - so Rage looked through Roy's merchant mart for 30/32 armour pieces. I managed to find all five bits at +11 for on average a little under 1.5 million each...so in effect I upgraded Rage's set from +10 to +11, and then got her old +10 set changed into mage armour, which I traded across to Gamer. As she said her previous set was +1, that ought to make her fighting a lot easier. I really don't know if Gamer thinks it is a loan or a gift, but hey, Rage's armour is upgraded by the equivalent of five extreme stones for less than eight million, which doesn't seem unreasonable even at Tairen prices.

Also just before lunch, SirGalahad succeeded in getting his horse to level 37; so, he was able to log out for a well-earned rest for a few hours.

After the break I traded across a +15 level 29 mage staff, over on Auzura, from Memree to RedRider, who got Collector Ryl to change it into the crossbow she needed. And then the afternoon session starred the Discipline Duo, Rage and RedRyder, back on Tairen-1. It seems that Prokion Temple does start to get busy in the afternoons, normally it's the morning when Rage and Red go there - I had an annoying rogue called GIOURAS sneaking in to attack some of the orc fighters towards the end, which slowed me down a little, but Rage ended up by 10.73% (after adding just 0.20% and 1 sp at the recent event) and 89 guild points, while RedRyder added 3.76% and 14 guild points. They each earned 205 skill points - which takes Red's total of spare sp above the 3k mark.

Before the late afternoon food break, SirGalahad traded across the level 37 horse to Kaerella, who at level 22 won't half get through the quality stones if she uses a mount outside town, and then took a drake egg to Lorraine, and then on to Jajan. It was just on 4:25pm when he started to level his new dragon hatchling in Maargadum Jail - a good long session down there got it up to 100% Sympathy, and well into level 8 by bedtime.

The evening session was, luckily, pretty straightforward - my cleric Kaerella, out in Cariae-1's Dratan desert, killing akane giants, including of course the elite one. I was able to join a party led by the level 108 titan Morganic, who was sp-farming , and levelling his pet, on the level 106 anubis spear men. He left about halfway through, bequeathing the party to me, which I kept going safely. I had to go back to Randol after three hours to renew the Elizabeth's Enhancement buff, and put four new heaven stones away and sell a drop or two to get Kae's weight down - then I went back out for another half hour, before at last calling it a night.

There had been a "random prize drop" announced in Randol on Cariae-4 during the evening, but my experience of such things is that they can be disappointing, so I stayed with the akane giants...and got a heaven stone and a couple of Hands during the time I'd have been away, so I probably ended up ahead.

Kaerella added 23.43% experience, 216 more skill points, and 2230 pet points, which takes Kae's drake SirFrancis to a third of the way through level 48. And Kae herself just needs 5% to get to level 54, not that that qualifies her for any new skills, weapons or armour, so it won't be a very exciting level to reach. Still, it is all progress...