Keeping Busy on Hatzring

MistressDomino on Auzura-5 had another crashy end to her overnight selling session, with the "send error report?" window popping up, but she managed to sell around 35 million's worth of stuff before that... not a lot, when things one is hoping to buy may be on offer for a billion or so. I did get her back into selling action for the morning, as I had to go out shopping and so wouldn't be able to do anything more active in Last Chaos, but another 297.500 gold wasn't much when the items one is offering have a total value of approaching 500 million. I guess it's a quiet time of day, with the US asleep and Europe just waking up, and at least there were a few more purchases during the lunch break.

Enchantra over on Hatzring-5 did a lot better, however, starting with 548 gold and reaching 138 million by morning; I restocked her as much as I could for the morning, and she managed to bring in almost 23 million more, selling everything except some item drop boosters. So, the gold for upgrading the Discipline guild will be no problem, and some sort of shopping spree for good armour for LordDarth and Kaerella beckoned.

After lunch the first thing to do was start spending all that gold. I got a bit of a bargain in a level 29 Jungle Bow +4 for only 50,000 gold, being sold by Alvultra, but that rather encouraged me to try to get a good 30/32 armour set - and by good, I do mean expensive.

It was strange, looking through the available armour listings in Roy's merchant mart on Hatzring; it is one of the oldest servers, and this was reflected in a lot of high-level stuff being for sale, level 120 or so, and very little low-level material at all. Eventually I did find a few pieces from the 30/32 armour sets, but they were very rare, and quite often the price reflected this rarity.

Luckily, persistence paid off, and I finally found +10 gloves for just 1 million, headgear for 1.2 million, and boots for 2 million. I had seen a +14 shirt for 60 million, which, considering the items and risks needed to get that high seemed pretty reasonable to me, and +13 leggings for just 15 million, so, since I could afford them, I bought them, and then changed all the pieces into the healer versions of the armour, for Kaerella.

So, the afternoon session involved Kaerella and LordDarth on Hatzring-5 going to Prokion Temple. As Kae was level 25, she could wear the new +10 gloves, and later in the session the shirt and skirt from the new armour set became available when she reached level 26, which gave her a pretty good defence rating; as a knight LordDarth has pretty good defence anyway, and Kae was able to heal him if necessary. Our main base of operations soon became the room alongside my favourite back room, where a few mummies share the area with orc soldiers - generally Kae would attract the orcs' attention with a few well-placed arrows, and Darth would attack them once they had come near.

By the end of the session, Kaerella had gone up by 147.93%, and was past the halfway mark in level 26; she had earned 162 skill points on top of the 140 she already had, so was able to learn the first, big level of Resurrection, costing 250 sp, and boost her Party Heal too. SirDarth had gone up from 20 to 23, adding 307.84% and 158 skill points.

As we still had some gold left, before the evening session some more shopping took place, and as well as a +10 level 33 sword, which Darth will be able to use when he reaches level 29, for just a million, we replaced his unplussed "Light of Odin" sword with a +8 one for 20 million, and got Kaerella a +9 version of her bow, for 35 million - so those better weapons speeded up the evening's work somewhat.

As well as some further work alongside the back room, and indeed in the corridor outside it, which has level 23 orc soldiers mixed with a few level 25 orc fighters, Kaerella and LordDarth were able to venture into the back room itself, though being careful not to go too far into the middle. A level 23 sorcerer called Socerer121 came in and asked to join our party, so we let him in, and, while he was slightly difficult to keep alive as he did like to run into the depths of the room, things went okay. I noticed early on that he didn't have the Elizabeth's Enhancement buff on, so he went back to town to get it, and later reached level 24. Kaerella reached level 27, too, and so was able to wear the whole of her deluxe 30/32 armour set.

After a while Socerer121 decided that we ought to move to a different spot - so we ended up in the central area of the temple, on the gallery at the top of the stairs, still killing axemen and sergeants, until he had to leave - and then I returned to my back room. Before long I had another new recruit to the party, a level 18 French knight called cavalier. He needed a bit more effort to keep alive, as he did seem to like to run around the room gathering an orc posse. It was lucky Kae had upgraded her Party Heal. He did reach level 19, and soon after that had to leave.

Kaerella reached 97.67% of the way through level 27, meaning she had gone up 141.00%; as she doesn't want to go above level 27 until her skills are maximised, and even the non-special ones are far from complete yet, she went back to Randol, spent all but one of the 158 skill points she'd earned, and then went to Maargadum Jail for her first set of "suicide runs", to get her back to the start of level 27. LordDarth continued some fighting while she was away, mainly out in the corridor. After the necessary 33 deaths, Kae returned to Randol, got the Elizabuff again, and rejoined LordDarth in the back room.

We kept going until Kae had got another 100 skill points; she'd gone up 65.12% by then, so, after learning the second level of Resurrection, taking all 100 sp, there was just time for 22 more suicide runs in Maargadum Jail.

By the end of the evening, SirDarth was halfway through level 26, having added 342.45% and 276 skill points. He is likely to go solo for his next few sessions, so has borrowed Kae's armour set, converting it into the knight equivalent - when he reaches level 31 and gets his own free +10 set, Kae can have the better set back. Darth upgraded the guild to level four, which used 120 of his skill points - the next two guild levels come available when he reaches level 30, costing 240 and 500 skill points, along with 1 and 2 million gold; after that, Kaerella can have her experience gain frozen on 50%, so that she can go twice as long between "suicide run" outings.

After the active time, SirDarth, my pet-leveller, logged in on Sarissa-4 and went out to the bandits in Merac. A Pandora's Box he opened disgorged a level 50 pandora's beast, so he moved a little way away from his normal spot. After a few minutes, I noticed a rogue called Tayunari there - she had killed the beast, and was now fighting the bandit I wasn't sparring with, and the local butchers, which were a bit low-level for somebody who could get rid of a level 50 critter. So, it seemed likely that she was trying to persuade the Grand Red Dragon, Merac's raid boss, to appear.

And indeed, it didn't take long for the "GRD" to arrive. "Ah, your luring worked - good luck", I said. She just answered with a "?", so I went on "I was assuming that you were trying to lure the GRD". "Yeah, lol", she said, and, after the GRD was vanquished, "Best spot for spawning I found."

She didn't stay to get rid of the Cerebri that the GRD spawns when its health gets low - I noticed she didn't bother to pick up the "hero's necklace", either, but then, that particular item is usually rubbish. Still, the Cerebri won't still be there tomorrow, as tonight we have the usual maintenance downtime for the servers, which wipes away any anomalies like that. Whatever else it wipes away, or brings in, we will have to wait to find out.

There was a special event this evening, though a bit late, on most servers, for me - a special class versus class PvP event at the "proving grounds" arena in Dratan. Such events are usually a recipe for chaos, let's hope things worked more smoothly tonight. [GM]Moose was making a special appearance for this, lured back from his new responsibilities on another Aeria fantasy mmorpg, Shaiya, which is a nice touch. Tomorrow, it will be time for another "Creature Carnival". Sadly, Auzura doesn't seem to be getting its usual European events this week, let us hope that normal service will soon be resumed.