Just Call Me Ks-rella...

I was impressed with the way the new computer handled its updates this morning - I chose what I wanted from what was available, including new graphics card drivers, and then was informed that the updates would be applied at 3:00am tomorrow morning. What was slightly less impressive was to come back after breakfast and find the computer frozen, with a "no graphics card drivers" notice and a few other blurry windows on a black background, so that I had to do a manual restart, but once that was done, everything seemed back to normal.

That did mean my cleric Kaerella lost a little time in her attendance half hour, but not much, and the usual group soon got through their times, with a little mining along the way. Zenderfly (spellchecker suggestions: Underflow, Underfloor, Thunderflash, and Wonderful) got in touch with Barbarienne, and we checked that she did have a character in Norcaine over on Auzura as well as Cariae, so that we can keep in touch. She is level 114 now, and feels she has outgrown the Tomb - she has been busy getting rich in Strayana lately. When MistressSabina was on a little later, godofbeasts was chatting to her - he too is making good gold, from Egeha quests, about 14 million over the last couple of days from each of his two characters who are the right level there. He remembered having fun with the giants: "between 2-4 million per full inventory of drops."

The new patch was again tiny, if there was anything at all. "The developers have responded with a list of bugs they are reporting fixed", Xuse2005 reported cautiously. "We will be checking to confirm these issues are resolved", he added, which seems very sensible. "These fixes will be released with the new content. More fixes will follow." As for the new stuff itself, he assured us that "Testing of the new content is in full swing! We're working as hard as we can to make sure the massive amount of updates will be released nice and clean!" Let us hope their efforts are successful. A screenshot showed a new SWAT-type "Police" costume for a titan... and as for the problems with the web item mall, well, they appreciate our patience...

As an experiment, SirGalahad didn't take a spike canine on the ground floor of the Jail to pet-level on - with horse buffs active, he ran down to the fifth floor, and, luckily avoiding the death mask soldiers, was able to start sparring with the level 44 death mask lancer. While the horse buffs lasted he had no problems, and even when they ran out, leaving Gal with a physical defence of 1260, his health bar remained full. Not many level 24 characters can pet-level on a death mask lancer, I'm sure!

CaptainScarlet followed SirGalahad down; he got ambushed by both death mask soldiers as he entered floor five, but managed to kill one, and lured the other off to the side, for his own pet-levelling stint.

SirGalahad logged out after lunch, with his horse just having reached level 24. MistressDomina logged in, and, once she'd found that the Tomb of Theos was on 90% easy, Kaerella, my level 101 archer (Auzura has my archer of that name, Cariae has my cleric - simple, eh?) logged in as well, instead of CaptainScarlet. There was a disconnection just as I was doing that, but I didn't think much about it, and MistressDomina logged back in and they both went to the Tomb entrance, where Kaerella had her small quest reward for killing fifty sphinx fighters.

They went in, and found the first corridor corner after the main anubis spear man room free, and settled in - or started to settle in, anyway, as at that moment there was another disconnection...from what other relogging players said in Randol, and reports in the forum shoutbox, it was a mass disconnection for poor long-suffering Auzura again.

MistressDomina and Kaerella returned to the same spot in the Tomb - Kaerella had to get her quest reward and new quest from Atum again, so hopefully the small "rollback" returned the money Kae and MD paid to get in the first time. By the time they got back to the corner the dungeon time hour had started, but I was unwilling to risk expensive potions and a PBI with frequent disconnections...so in the end MistressDomina, supported by Kaerella, did a kind of unboosted "power hour", before moving across to the ancient grey mummies for around 50 minutes. By the time I went off to start on food preparation, MistressDomina had added just 1.58% and 20 skill points, plus 1796 pet points, while Kaerella was up by 2.08%, 17 skill points, and 1513 pet points. The archer laavaa was there, someone we'd known from MD's times fighting the screaming zombies, looking very smart in a new armour set.

Kae and MD stayed in the mummies' room over the food break, and then returned to the spear man side in time for the five to six o'clock dungeon time hour. That corridor corner was already taken, so my duo ended up in the main room. over on the far side. We were sharing it with the level 91 titan Netharel, and MistressDomina started her berserker, platinum adrenaline, and small crit potions when the "dt" hour began, plus the platinum blessed iris, and began using the experience boosters.

Unfortunately a night shadow called LilMitchyy95 came in, and also started fighting the anubis spear men - and there really aren't enough spear men for three people. "Please move further in, LilMitchy, there are not enough spear men for 3 in this room", MistressDomina said, but he ignored this. So, Kaerella started to target the spear men that he was fighting, which of course isn't good news if you are using boosters. "Heyyyy - ksing man?"

"You have been asked politely to move on", Kaerella said, and Netharel added "Can you see the room is taken Lil..." The response was "I have? K, 2 sec... sorry", and he did, thankfully, move further into the Tomb. Always polite, MistressDomina did say "Thanks", but he may have been out of range by then. It's handy to have a supporting character there like Kaerella, who can do such things while MD concentrates on trying to get full value from her potions. If a sphinx fighter attacks MD, she is able to deal with it, too, while MD concentrates on the spear men.

The hour wasn't quite at maximum strength, then, as we lost out on a few spear men until things were sorted out, but MistressDomina still managed to get through 56 experience boosters, which meant that she gained 26.38% in level 106, which isn't too bad - plus 10 skill points. We didn't stay long afterwards, but the few kills before the hour began meant that MD's early evening session added 26.58%, 11 skill points, and 1371 more pet points, while Kaerella added another 1.67%, 10 skill points, and 838 pet points. MistressDomina's 15% extra "skill pill" will run out soon, and then they will both get the same number of skill points...until Kae takes her turn to start one, when she gets to 103.

I had to leave Last Chaos soon after that, to make some preparations for my usual Wednesday evening entertainments - but I was able to keep CaptainScarlet going, pet-levelling on a death mask soldier, so that by the end of the evening his current drake had reached the two-thirds mark in level 49.