Unhappy Halloween

The new week's patch notes were happy to announce that the Halloween event had finally started. On the face of it, everything was the same as in previous years, with Halloween candy, pumpkin ghosts, empty baskets, and so on, with the bonus of a "Scream" mask to earn, but people soon found out that there was some unwritten "small print" involved. Pumpkin helms from previous years do not, it seems, allow one to see and fight the ghosts; while shadow removal powder allows you to see the ghosts, it doesn't allow you to kill them; and, once you do get a new (time-limited) pumpkin helm, you will soon find that the possible rewards from your pumpkin-farming are drastically less, well, rewarding than in previous years. The lucky scrolls, along with the effort and experience ones, have vanished, so apart from very occasional packs of heaven stones, and moonstones, all you get is some minor health or mana potions, or firecrackers. So, it doesn't look as if people will be spending much time fighting the pumpkin ghosts this year. Oh, and the pumpkin jester that the in-game announcement advises one to look for, to claim one's free "evil headband", is missing.

The report that our product managers brought back from their visit to South Korea seems hopeful, though of course every new change brings its own glitchy pitfalls. Before the end of the year, we are told to expect a new dungeon in Strayana, a new pet, a new "monster card system", an "improved" user interface, a second Extreme Cube season, new costumes for castle owners, new guild skills, and the proverbial "much more".

What our brave product managers have requested from the developers include improvements to the two castle sieges, balancing changes to the arena PvP rules, more experience and skill exp from Mondshine monsters, a memory scroll that works in Mondshine, a return of that "attendance" system, though this time giving skill exp, and improvements to the skills for the more neglected types of character, such as clerics, elementalists, highlanders, and temple knights. Whether the hopelessly lazy and only marginally competent bunch of Barunson developers had a quick laugh, yawned, and threw the list into the waste paper basket once our men had left, we don't know.

"We also discussed potential content for 2011 and new strategies to ensure more frequent bug fixes", product manager Xuse2005 concluded. "We will be working diligently to ensure that Last Chaos is a fun and bug free experience with plenty of exciting new content. The journey won't be a simple one but we're pretty sure it will be fun!"

While there were no item mall changes to report, the "Akan Temple" has been added to Egeha, an all-new Raid Dungeon (and thus only active on the third sub-server of each group), designed for players from level 90 to level 110, with brand-new monsters and special new armour that only drops there. People in the shoutbox did report some problems there, but it does sound worth investigating.

I had work to do in the morning, and indeed the first part of the afternoon, which meant that RedRackham was busy pet-levelling on Auzura-6 from breakfast time, getting his drake past the halfway mark in level 43; his namesake on the Cariae server joined in at coffee time, to move his drake further through level 45. He started a little later than I'd planned since, while the new patch downloaded easily, once I'd as usual "paused" the Kaspersky Antivirus, the actual launching didn't work, so that in the end I needed to restart the computer. Thankfully, after that the game did launch without any further problems.

CaptainScarlet went back to the orc axemen and orc sergeants in Prokion Temple on Auzura-6, in a solo party with RedRackham, and stayed for a while - long enough to get a fourth-level Ignition run, though it seems impossible to use it fully there, as the supply of orcs runs out, and one has to wait for the respawning to start, which luckily it does before the buff ends. CaptainScarlet gained 17 skill points during the run alone.

After that, Cap returned to Randol to sell his loot. He hadn't got any of the Halloween "empty baskets", since the orcs are green-named to him, and, as before, the baskets only drop from monsters one's own level or above. While in Randol, he was able to get some skills - the final level of Wall of Belief, increasing his defence by 50, cost 216 skill points, but the Captain was also able to learn the first four levels of Deep Wound Training, for 44 skill points, to increase his chance of making a "deadly" hit by 8%.

The next thing to do was actually visit RedRackham in the Jail, as he had a pair of the level 33 dual swords, +10, which he wasn't using - since CaptainScarlet has plenty of defence from his armour and skills, he doesn't need to use a shield, so dual swords, with more attack power, seemed a good idea. Then the Captain started fighting the local berserkers and bandits which, at level 34 and 35, did drop empty baskets for him, as well as the usual loot, and by the time the food break was due, he'd collected 47 of them, which, exchanged at a scarecrow just outside Merac village, meant he had plenty of Halloween candies, and was able to get his pumpkin helm, He did actually fight a couple of pumpkin ghosts, but neither of them dropped anything. That Merac part of his afternoon had added 58 new skill points, while the whole session got him up by 29.70%.

The evening's event was "Whack a Fluton", or "What a Fluton" as the website's header called it. The website had the event happening on the fifth subserver of each server group, so MistressFelicia, my level 5 mage, who looks after my level 37 red dragon, went to the wrong place - when I finally noticed that the in-game announcement had said Auzura-6, things had already started. [GM]Darasuum was at the Dratan arena, and spawned the usual monsters, as well as a few jokes. What do you call a man in a swimming pool, with no arms or legs? "Bob", apparently. And a cow with the legs on one side longer than the legs on the other side produces "lean beef"...

Anyway, after the monsters had been vanquished, Dara spawned the traditional hands-loot, which meant that, not being worried about being pk-d due to her low level, Felicia was able to pick up 7 tool aids (useful, as before going out she'd used her last 4 to get some quality stones), a large attack potion, a skill point booster, and two item drop boosters.

Cariae's event was scheduled for seven, and this time we were again on the sixth sub-server...but we weren't in the Dratan proving grounds, the in-game announcements said Juno. So, that's where my local level 12 healer KarambA headed. I did fear that it would be a short [GM]JediMike event, given the easier venue, but, well, it was some anonymous GM or other, who provided lots of monsters, including nice low-level zombies that KarambA was able to kill, and also interacted, through the GM-style announcements, with people, responding to questions. We didn't get any more corny jokes though.

What we did get, as well as masses of flutons and a few patriarch botises, were kamiras, which was good news. Some of the usual goodies got stuck in the walls, but luckily no rare accessories - and KarambA, though she did get killed a few times by the monsters, managed to grab no less than 110 great healing potions, 70 medium mana potions, 35 moonstones, 40 lucky scrolls, and 5 crystals of experience (greater), plus memorising scrolls, tool aids, medals of honour, and six hero's necklaces, one of which, at least, seeming better than a magical necklace she had been using.

On Hatzring-6, as eight o'clock approached, my level 7 healer LadyJane arrived at the Juno arena to find [GM]Erock already there. He certainly gave good value, as he conjured up flutons, darkmind terrains, baby apes, sphinx fighters, poison mists, purple dragons, and much more for just about 45 minutes before departing - leaving another mob of flutons as a parting gift. There were some kamiras too - the first bunch were right in the far corner, so, with the flutons being active, LadyJane couldn't get to the loot, but a group at the end were a bit better, and she did manage, at least, a crystal of experience (greater), 10 each of the medium mana potions and great healing potions, 5 moonstones, 10 tool aids, and 5 scrolls of memorising, plus four hero's necklaces, not to mention plenty of medals of honour.

I missed the start of the Tairen-6 event, which started at 8:45, UK time, as we were still dealing with the final flutons on Hatzring, but when my level 7 healer Barbarienne reached the Randol arena, [GM]Erock had things under control. "A fluton has sensitive skin", he was telling people, as the monsters rushed around the arena. "A fluton will never look in a mirror. A fluton can eat an entire bucket of apples. A fluton will never ask you for your password. The life span of a fluton is longer than that of a chicken. Flutons have their own encyclopedias called Flupedias. A fluton will always remember the name of your mother. A fluton's spikes can be used for an eloquent gift to your father-in-law. The eyes of a fluton are made of metal. If a fluton is caught in a dark alley way, it is searching for chocolate. Flutons can easily be impressed with a box of chocolates." In response to a question, he assured us that "Flutons don't change light bulbs, they eat light bulbs. If a fluton asks for your keys, it has something in its teeth to pick out. When a fluton farts it says FLARTON. To whack a fluton you need a flute. The feet of a fluton can crush up to 10,000 cans at once - flutons have been known to be used in recycling centers across the world. Flutons can make juice from the spikes on their shoulders, it's called fluton surprise." He did ask us "How do you stop a fluton from crying?" - but no answer was forthcoming before he left, though the general consensus seemed to be that you should kill it.

After many different monsters, the farewell spawning ("GM erock says bye for now...") did include a generous number of kamiras; what with all the assorted monsters and all the kamira loot, the place got rather laggy for a while. After a few unsuccessful attempts, and runs back from the respawning area, Barbarienne did manage to get across to where there was some loot, and, before a fluton or a patriarch botis could kill her, managed to pick up 4 crystals of experience (greater), 10 lucky scrolls, 5 moonstones, 5 tool aids, and 40 medium mana potions. There was quite a bit of loot stuck in the wall - I even saw members of the Vendetta guild outside trying to grab some of the pieces.

So, while the pumpkin ghosts aren't our route to fresh supplies of lucky scrolls this year, fighting kamiras in the various arenas can get people some, at least. RedRackham had kept busy pet-levelling right through the day; despite being ks'd during the evening by a German knight called Auren1982, who seemed convinced that "pet levelling without a weapon is not allowed", by log-out time he was only about ninety minutes away from getting his drake back into level 44.