After the Elites

RedRackham lost two or three hours to a disconnection overnight, but otherwise things progressed well for him on Cariae-4, and his drake reached level 22 by morning. LordDarth went back to Maargadum Jail before breakfast on Hatzring-4, and continued to work on his horse.

I managed to have a morning session, after coffee, for SirKit on Cariae-5; RedRydeR went up to level 42 yesterday, and Kit needed to try and catch up a bit, to get close to level 32, for future combat party team-ups. I headed for my favourite back room in Prokion Temple, and had it to myself for much of the time - though a level 32 specialist sorcerer and a level 25 titan did come in towards the end, for a while. By the time lunch was almost ready, SirKit had gone up by 23.93%, and earned 135 more guild points for Discipline, as well as getting himself 181 skill points.

Over lunch, RedRackham, who is the guild master of the ForceWithin guild, went back to Merac for some more drake-levelling, and got his pet into level 23; over on Hatzring-4, meanwhile, LordDarth had at last got his horse into level 32. Both computers would be neded for more active playing for the afternoon session, though.

Kit was still 10% below reaching level 32, but for the afternoon a team-up with RedRydeR seemed the best option, starting as an equal party. But first, Red finally got around to learning the sixth level of Mental Defence, to increase her magical defence from 89 to 97, which became available when she reached level 41. Spending 150 skill points on that got her sp stash down to only marginally over the 22k mark - but learning the second levels of the special skills Master Weaponsmith and Master Armoursmith, which came available at level 42, took another 690. The third and final levels, at level 52, will need another 870, which will mean that all her special skills are fully at the max.

RedRydeR and SirKit made their equal party, got the Elizabeth's Enhancement buff, and headed down to the elite frenzied berserkers again. It didn't take very long for Kit to get the 10% he needed to reach level 32, so after that we were able to switch to a combat party. It was a little while after that when the level 32 sorcerer SirKit had encountered in the morning, egyptman, arrived, and asked to join the party, which, since it was a combat party, didn't make a huge amount of difference to me... the skill exp had to be split three ways, but in theory the experience per kill ought to have been boosted slightly.

Egyptman was one of those players who don't worry if their health is down to 20%, they will keep on attacking the monsters, even if those monsters are eight levels above them and elite. My feeling was that he ought still to be farming skill points in Prokion Temple, but he doesn't seem very keen on stocking up on sp. I managed to persuade him to go back to Randol to get the Elizabuff, but it wasn't long after that when he got killed, so lost the buff again.

He did kindly give me a couple of item drop boosters - and when he passed over a healer-type pumpkin headpiece, I took the opportunity to give him some small health potions, and small HP recovery pots.

When he got tired of the elite frenzied berserkers, he wanted to move to Maargadum Jail, so we did that for the last half hour of my session. With horse buffs, we ran through the ground floor, and headed for level three, killing the beast scythes, and a few beast archers. He did go afk for a while, but had the sense to, like SirKit, click on RedRydeR to follow her.

I carefully advised egyptman not to try to run back out of Maargadum Jail, but to log out or use a scroll of recall, and then left, for a rather lengthy food, and preparations for tomorrow, break. By then RedRydeR had added 42.04%, 47 skill points, and 1501 pet points, while SirKit was up by 21.94%, 46 skill points, and 138 guild points.

LordDarth went back to the fifth level of the Jail, over on Hatzring-4, to find that xDARKSHADOWx was in the preferred position closest to the entrance, so Darth went to the second death mask lancer, and got to work. Over on Cariae-4, RedRackham went back to his pair of bandits out in the open air in Merac, for a little drake-levelling.

Now that he had reached level 32, SirKit was able to learn all three levels of Defence Guard, raising his physical defence by 150 and costing 414 skill points, and the first five levels of Concentration, for 262 sp, which would apparently give RedRydeR, or anyone else with a snare/stun type skill with a 70% chance of success, a boost to an 87.5% chance of success for ten minutes. There's another level to learn at level 35, increasing the chance to 94.5% if the figures are right...though I must admit the figures do look a bit dubious, as with further levels of that skill you would end up with a success rate well over 100%. Still, presumably it increases the success rate at least a little bit. There are some other slightly tempting skills, but Kit's sp stash isn't a big one.

As SirKit, in a combat party, doesn't earn as much experience as RedRydeR, it looks as if he does need his own regular solo sessions - which have the advantage of earning him rather more skill points. So, the evening session saw him fighting in my favourite back room in Prokion Temple again, where he stayed until the three-hour Elizabuff was over. It seemed to continue for ages after the countdown was finished, that must have added an extra five minutes, and meant that he got past the halfway mark in level 32, adding 39.62% and 380 skill points, along with 271 guild points.

Kit was in a solo party, which had a fairly precarious time for a while, down to just two active members, plus four blanks where people had logged out. Eventually the leadership passed to me, and I trimmed out the people who'd been logged out for a while...and we did actually get up to a full active eight at one stage, though I think we were down to six when I left. A level 88 player called "blaaaaah", although they responded to my original "hi" with just "blah", did get a bit chatty later on, and I left the party in their hands. I did wonder when fighting sorcerer spirits in the spirit cave was mentioned, but that was a higher-level character on blaaaaah's account. Raging spirits of the sorcerer are level 134, so not ideal opponents for a level 88-er. If you are approaching level 130, they must be okay...after all, you can't keep fighting Sphinx Commanders forever, they are "only" level 109.

LordDarth had continued his pet-levelling through the evening, and managed to get around three-quarters of the way through his horse's level 32; RedRackham logged in once SirKit had logged out, and got back to work on his drake, moving through level 23.

The main event today was a "hide and seek" in Merac, but even on Auzura that didn't start until ten in the evening, UK time. There was an all-server "happy hour", too, with 50% extra experience, but that wasn't scheduled to start until an hour later. So, not much use for me.

Tomorrow being one of my busy Sundays, I'll only be on in the evening, hopefully in good time for the Sunday Quiz at 8:30 UK time. There should also be what they are calling a "dungeon run", but which really seems to be an "Egeha Run", but Katar starts that at ten, with Cariae half an hour later - and Auzura later in the rota, at midnight. The cost of getting to Egeha (800,000 gold) may put off any lower level people from going along...I would take Rage or Barbarienne if the event started a bit earlier, but that is a bit too late in the evening, after a busy day, for me.