An Empty Tomb

Both my level 22 pet-levelling knights started work relatively early, at least for a Sunday morning.  SirPerivale took some time off later while Kaerella used twenty tool aids, and twenty healer hammers, to mine some more quality stones.  Kae then went across to SirDarth in Merac while he fought his Berserker, and traded 500 across to him.  On the way from Darth to Maargadum Jail, she did encounter one Pandora's Box, which when opened revealed five moonstones.

A not very long late morning session in Maargadum Jail, with the Beast Scythes on level two mainly, added 3.40%, 16 skill points, and 297 pet points - it took Kae to exactly halfway through level 44.  One thing I noticed after a while was that she no longer had a resurrection scroll active, the "roll-back" from last night's mass disconnection had removed it, as it had only recently been applied.  And of course, with Last Chaos, this didn't mean that the unused scroll had reappeared in her inventory.

Over lunch both the horses levelled up, so SirDarth's blue horse is level 32 now, and SirPerivale's horse is level 24.  That means six and two starvation points per five minutes, respectively.  I see that Darth's current level is almost exactly twice as long as Peri's, 9457 as opposed to 4746 pet points.

I swapped the horses over between the two knights, on the feeling that with all thirty levels of Armour Increase, Peri's +3 armour would be enough for him to withstand a Berserker's attack, while Darth's +5 armour and twenty-three levels ought also to be okay; Peri's defence rating was now 858, and Darth's 848, so things are pretty equal.  But it was time for Darth to take a rest, and Kaerella to sign in again.

I started off with the Giants, using the last of the 24-hour 30% extra experience potion, but after that CZnaruto2 gave me the call to go to the Sphinx Fighters on Auzura-1.  It was a bit strange to begin with, actually, I got absorbed into the main party of people, did a Party Heal and the horse buffs - and found myself out in the cold again.  One of the regulars did team up with me, though, until what I assume was a mass disconnection, at least there were very few people there when I got back.

For most of the afternoon I was teamed with CZnaruto2 and, after a while, a titan, terry95, and thanks to extra experience from the Sunday teatime bonus, by the time the food break came up, I'd gone up another 45.78%, and added 5 skill points.

CZnaruto2 rather annoyed me later, though, asking me to come to the Tomb of Theos - and when I got inside, after paying the 132,000 gold admission fee, there was only him there, not a functioning party.  I did try Slow Shot on a Screaming Zombie, but couldn't get it down in health all that much, and had to run for it - and when I went back, as I'd left its immediate circle its health had returned to 100%.  CZ left, asking me to go to the Sphinxes, but I didn't feel like that, and went to Maargadum Jail instead, where it didn't take all that long to get the last 4% or so that I needed to reach level 45.

I continued on there until it was time for the Quiz, which was still an hour early by UK time, as our clocks don't go forward an hour for another week.  Luckily the questions were the usual ones, I think they don't even bother to change the order of them any more, so everything went smoothly.  And after that, there was an upgrade event, which is starting to get traditional for Sunday after the Quiz.  Ratel was on for the Quiz, and BasheR too - I don't think Ratel used his newly-acquired heaven stones this time, but Bash reported mixed fortunes, including the breakage of a +14 item.

After the Quiz I took Kaerella out to the Akane Giants again; I'd not got anything worth upgrading, so I just put my heaven stones in storage.  By the time Kae logged out, the evening session in its low-key way had added just 12.16%, plus 64 skill points, so that the day's total was 61.34% experience, 85 skill points, and 2159 pet points.

SirPerivale continued his work, chatting rather a lot with a level 33 knight called failure2020, who was killing plenty of Berserkers, before starting a platinum pet experience potion to try and level his horse up.  He was hitting bare-handed for 53, so the Berserkers didn't last very long for him.  By the end of the evening, it looks to me, as I type, that Peri's horse ought just to be able to reach level 33.

Sphinxes - and Zombies!

SirPerivale continued his work levelling Stavanic's horse this morning, though Steve was offline by the time that I was able to reply to his enquiry about the current level at lunchtime - level 19 then. He reappeared a little later, though, and reckoned that that level was high enough for his purposes, so Peri traded the horse back to him, and was given a small cash reward and a useful defence-based accessory. SirDarth had managed to fit in some quality time with the pale blue horse too, which was halfway through level 30 by then.

Kaerella did manage to go along to Maargadum Jail in the morning, and started one of the one-hour, 30% extra potions - or was it an elixir?  I did open the twenty Experience Boxes from a "St Patty: Secret Treasure" package (well, it was not only "buy one, get one free" for 799ap last night, they threw in a package of five chaos smelting stones too), and didn't get any platinum blessed irises at all, mainly potions and elixirs, but at least four blessed irises did turn up.  My endeavours, aided by a one-hour + 30% potion, did bring in 10.23% experience, at least, and 34 skill points.

In the afternoon I started off with the Giants, and Akane Giants, before getting the usual invitation to go to the Sphinx Fighters; the size of the party there does fluctuate a lot, but it is quite fun, in a hair-raising way, to be part of a large party, though if I'm the only healer things get a bit fraught, and I'm just standing there spamming Heal Party and Heal, and starting new medium-size mana potions.  People generally don't complain when they die, which is just as well, as Kaerella is an archer, not a specialist healer, I don't have Fast Heal or Greater Heal, which a cleric would be able to use.

The experience gained from the afternoon session was 27.65%, along with 17 skill points - those would mainly have come from some further time in Maargadum Jail between Sphinx outings.

The evening session was almost entirely a marathon Sphinx Fighter slogathon, with the same familiar faces, with the party started by CZnaruto2, and various other specialist sorcerers, rogues, and so on - you know, I think we did once have a mage for half an hour or so, but I don't remember any knights at all, it's generally mainly spec-sorcs and titans.  

Morean, a level 52 titan who'd been in the previous Sphinx parties, had asked me earlier if I wanted to join him on a trip to the Forgotten Temple, but bearing in mind that the monsters there are above the level of the Sphinx "Speer" Men and Fighters, and tend to have magical attack skills, I was unavailable for that.  He did join our Sphinx party after a while, which waxed and waned, it got confusing when the party split in two so that people one had previously backed up, one now had to avoid KS-ing.  Still, we re-united, and, at probably about a quarter to nine, Morean decided that we could, as a team, try out the Tomb of Theos - and teleported us there.

I'd already used a skill point restoration scroll, and, as I'd finished my supply of those, moved on to using the full resurrection scrolls, which preserve both one's skill points and one's experience - and I did get through two of those in the Tomb, even with my best dodge-to-the-wall skills.  Still, when we did manage to kill a Screaming Zombie, my share of the experience was about 1.7 million, as I had started a 24-hour + 30% pot at the beginning of the afternoon, and thankfully it meant real time rather than game time - rather better than the 17,000, roughly, that the Maargadum Jail types give.

Morean reached level 53 while we were there.  We got off to a bad start, in attacking a Zombie that a mage was already fighting - and, as we were on a PvP server, Auzura-1, she showed her displeasure by killing almost everyone - she probably used Chaos Nova, I was far enough back but suddenly most of the team's health bars went from red to black, while her name went red too.  As using Party Heal does tend to attract monsters, I did have to hug the wall sometimes, but on a couple of occasions I was just not quick enough.  One of those was that old problem of somebody luring a Screaming Zombie and kiting it, but not being able to finish the job so that, annoyed and frustrated, it wanders back along the corridor, and we were in its way.

Well, over on Cariae, with Keerella as a level 90 mage in that kind of situation, I tend to let people KS me, as a group or individually, and I've seen how slowly people even at Morean's level damage a Zombie - it was hard to keep Morean's health bar up, he was using a health stealer and lots of buffs but was still being hit hard, and it took quite a while for the assembled rogues, specialist sorcerers in their knight-type avatar, and others to wear a zombie down.  I'm sure the rest of the party averaged a death or two as well - but by the end of the evening session, the Sphinx types and the Zombies between them had got me up another 59.97% on the experience side.  12 skill points had come in too. 

I'd reached level 44 fairly early in the session, and had got almost halfway through that level, which was worth having to use a resurrection scroll or two.  In all today Kae added 97.85%, 63 skill points, and for SirFrancis 1922 pet points. We would have gone on a bit longer, but at a quarter past nine, UK time, there was a mass disconnection on Auzura-1, which seemed a good point at which to stop, for me, as I was already starting to feel a bit tired, and it had been a rather intense session.  It was bad timing, as Morean was just kindly attempting to trade some mana potions, and an experience booster, to me!

Now that Stavanic has reclaimed his horse, SirDarth has taken over use of the second computer, so that the pale blue horse being prepared for Kae has had a chance to reach level 31.  Some passer-by did kill his Berserker once, but I noticed the lack of activity fairly promptly, so that by closing time the horse should be about 40% of the way through that level.  SirPerivale can join in when Kae isn't online, during breaks, and, after taking back the horse that MistressDomino was looking after for him, has got the animal comfortably into level 23 now.  I see Darth is running low on quality stones, which isn't surprising as his horse is now getting through one every five minutes...but at least he has the Armour Increase buff maximised now, so that his total defence is 918, which means that the Berserkers definitely can't do him any harm.

Equinox

SirDarth and SirPerivale got an earlier start than I'd intended today.  I've come down with a cold, so am not at my brightest, with a rather broken night, and absent-mindedly got up an hour early - or a week or so early, as the switch to "British Summer Time" fairly soon will do the same thing.  I assumed the bathroom clock's battery was giving out, was surprised to see that the newspaper hadn't arrived, and then finally noticed that the radio presenter hadn't changed, sigh...

 Anyway, SirPerivale has had a busy day working on Stavanic's pony - or horse, as she became in the early evening when she reached level 16.  SirDarth worked on Kae's blue horse for the first half of the morning, and over the food breaks, and managed to get him to level 30 just before 5:30pm, UK time, so there's just one more level before he becomes mountable...though level 37 is the aim of course.

In the morning Kaerella managed, with the help of those Elite Frenzied Berserkers, to get the 10% she needed to reach level 43 - despite having to go to get rid of one of those level 50 Pandora Beasts, released when Peri opened a nearby box!  This one dropped 106,400 gold, which Peri and Kae shared, as they were already in a party for "solo party" purposes, and Peri was close by when Kae made the kill.  After that Kae used a memory scroll to get back to the EFBs, and I thought Peri was bugged or something, as he started to kill Butchers bare-handed at quite a speed.  I soon noticed that he'd been in range when Kae had used horse buffs, so that was what had increased his attack so much.  Luckily it wore off fairly quickly.

Stavanic was having bug problems - his rogue Kaylie was no longer in his DeathBringers guild, and although she came to Merac and the Butchers to get re-recruited by SirPerivale, it wouldn't "take", so she remains guildless.  Apparently her memory scrolls have lost the memorised locations, too.  I noticed that the DeathBringers guild roster includes the un-named level 0 titan as guild master, too, which is a pretty common bug.

After lunch, Kaerella used her four new stat points to finally get her Constitution to 17, which meant she could at last get the level 38 passive skill Survival Training (for 293 skill points), increasing her defence rating by 100; now she needs to get her Dexterity up to 52 for the level 44 skill Poison Arrow, which will take until level 47.  With 17 stat points each in Constitution and Intelligence, it's now Dexterity all the way, which makes sense for an archer.

The Elite Frenzied Berserkers are now green-named for Kaerella, so it is time to bid them a fond farewell - until my other characters reach an appropriate level, anyway.  So with her extra defence, Kae went out to Dratan and the Giants, and made an attempt on the Elite Arcane Giant, in fact, but his extra hit points proved too much, he reached Kae with way too much health remaining even using Slowshot, and Kae was lucky to escape with her life.  Once I'd healed myself I ventured near again, but what I'd heard is true, to avoid people doing the more extreme kinds of power-levelling for their friends, if you leave a monster's immediate area its health resets to 100%.

After killing a few giants, I moved over to Maargadum Jail, and settled in there for a while - until I had a call from one of the people I'd teamed with yesterday, to go to the Sphinx types.  It seemed that most of the same people were along, though I was the only healer; it wasn't an awfully long session, which was just as well as my food break was coming up.  The afternoon had only added 18.81%, but at least it was fairly varied.

The evening session started with Jail, and then again I got the call to go to Sphinx Fighter central.  This session was a bit longer, again spearheaded by the titan Morean.  The level 36 specialist sorcerer CZnaruto2 (from the Czech Republic of course) decided to apply to join Norcaine, so I clicked the "accept" button, though was too busy running and healing, and even sometimes using the bow, and remembering to redo the horse buffs when necessary, that I don't think I said anything at all.  His brother CZnaruto6, a level 25 sorcerer (though he mentioned he has a titan too) also asked to join, it was ages before I could do more than type "sry a bit busy here", but after we finished, and I was back in Dratan City, he joined Norcaine too.  I don't know what they are expecting, we'll see if they decide to stick around - #2 did actually ask to be kicked a little later, I'm not sure if that is temporary or not.

After a recovery period, I got the summons to head to the Sphinxes again, and the party was pretty similar - we started with seven or eight, but we ended with just three, and one of them was afk.  The gold dropped was pretty good; at one stage I did get a sorcerer weapon, but somebody wanted it, so bought it, I think he put about 260,000 gold in the trading box, I was a bit too busy to really take much notice.  I did die once, but was able to use my skill point restoration scroll, and trigger a new one.  I seemed to do a lot of running around being chased by Sphinx Fighters, spamming Heal Party to try and keep everyone, myself included, alive.

So, that was enough excitement for one day.  The evening session added 29.68% and (mainly from Maargadum Jail) 14 skill points, so that Kae's gain for the day had reached 59.32% experience, and 45 skill points - minus the ones invested in that extra defence skill, of course.

Fighting the Sphinx types does get a bit hectic, and I can't say I'm too happy being the only source of healing, because as an archer rather than a cleric I am a bit limited in what I can do.  Hopefully it will soon be time to move on to the Tomb of Theos; the Screaming Zombies may be level 100, but at least you only get, if you are careful, one at a time.

Up and Down

As usual, SirDarth got an early start, and started to level up the pale blue horse; it was already about three-quarters of the way through level 27 when he started, and soon after breakfast the horse reached level 28.  It wasn't long after lunch when level 29 was reached, as well.

Stavanic was on for a while before lunch, which in his time zone means playing before heading off to school in the morning; he produced another level 1 pony which he'd like levelled up a bit, so SirPerivale took charge of that one, and moved the horse he'd been working on over to MistressDomino - not to be sold, just so that it wouldn't lose sympathy by being in Peri's inventory but not equipped.

SirPerivale opened a Pandora's Box near to where he was fighting a Butcher, but there was no reward inside, just a level 50 Pandora Beast; I thought I'd moved far enough away from it, but when I returned from being afk, it was just finishing killing my poor pony.  So, I had to take a trip back to town to get the poor thing "unsealed" - to find that the Animal Trainer charges 0 gold for returning a level 1 pony to life, which is sensible.

I used a purification gem on SirPerivale's gauntlets again, after once more getting a bloodseal that gave him extra strength points - and yet again "physical prowess" (as strength is called in such circumstances) turned up, increasing his bare-knuckle hit from 26 to 28.  Now that those gloves have all three bloodseals again, I think I'm giving up, on gloves that particular addition just comes up too often, and the other additions are mainly to attack.  So, one more purification gem must be used, and then no more bloodsealing attempts.  Other bloodseals, on other pieces of armour, give evasion and physical defence, so the bloodsealing was generally worth doing.

It's good to know that, with his +3 armour, SirPerivale can fight Butchers at least without losing health, without a pet buff.  The pony did reach level three over a slightly extended lunch break, so was at least be able to give a small buff later - level two of Increased Armour adds 30 to defence.  Peri continued for the rest of the day, and the pony was up to level 10 by logging-out time.  He had moved over to the lip of the "extinct volcano", to be well clear of the Pandora Beast, and when another Box appeared there - well yes he did open it, and yes there was another level 50 Beast.  

This time, since the place seemed to be filling up with prowling Beasts, Kaerella came out to deal with them; the first one had vanished, but the more recent one was easily defeated by her, and dropped 85,600 gold.

BasheR reports that some people he had been partying with in the Tomb have now got too high for him; he did join a team there this morning, but they were weak and slow and the party didn't last long, though he still managed to add 30% to his experience.  He asked me what I thought of a set of 55/57 +7 armour which someone was selling for 50 million, and my advice was that he should grab it - which he did, after talking the vendor down by 10%.  I'm envious, we don't see many sets like that for sale on Auzura yet.

Kaerella was looking to see if she could find any bargains like that when BasheR invited me into a party.  As there weren't any other people around with the Tomb of Theos on their minds, he decided to go to the level 63 Sphinx Fighters and level 64 Sphinx Speer Men (sic); as they aren't too far from the entrance to the Tomb, I teleported to that location, and rode across.  We started as a twosome, but the party soon grew; BasheR himself didn't stay all that long, as he did, at level 49, "cap" one or two new members.

We got up to seven at one stage; where we were there was an Elite Speer Man, who gives 636,593 experience, which even divided five or siz ways was rather useful.  Early on we had three specialist-type sorcerers, and towards the end we had three archers, which, as it happens, was a bit unfortunate.  One member was keen to use one of the "Summon Death Knight of Iris" books, which I see costs 299 aeria points.  I wasn't much in favour, as the Elite Speer Men give almost as much experience, but, with freshly-applied horse buffs, and the healers staying well back, the Knight was summoned.  I think everyone except me and another healer was killed, but, after he'd moved to follow us, people respawned, and we did actually manage to defeat the boss monster finally.

There were a few deaths along the way, despite the best efforts of us archers - and right at the end, I finally got killed myself.  I was just clicking on the skill point restoration scroll I'd got active - when another healer resurrected me!  That meant I didn't have the chance to avoid losing the skill points, so I was not happy.  While I ended the session up by 35.57% experience, I was down in all 284 skill points, so must have lost something approaching 300 of them.

After the food break, I decided that a slog with the Elite Frenzied Berserkers was called for - dull work, but safe enough, and with a little bit of skill exp.  I did use another of those 30%-extra-experience pots for an hour, and so that helped a little, so that the session, by the time I'd finished, added another 27.04% experience and 61 skill points, so that over the whole day I was up by a useful 62.61% experience - and down by just 223 skill points.  2618 pet points got added along the way, so hopefully SirFrancis should reach level 29 tomorrow.

There was a mass disconnection at about a quarter to seven, UK time; Kaerella and SirPerivale quickly returned, and were still in the same party as before, but as it was, I suppose, approaching his log-out time Ratel didn't reappear, and so remained in our party only as far as the member list was concerned, apparently level one.  He had done the third personal dungeon earlier, and managed to kill Blood Mistress Kamira - probably easier for a knight than a titan, and, well, he is three levels higher than Chuck, but still pretty good going.   He did nearly log out when the second doorway wouldn't open, but took my advice to go back and clear out any late-spawning trolls, and after he found one such, was able to continue.

I must say that I'd never been aware of that problem with resurrection scrolls, or skill point restoration scrolls - if a healer used the resurrection skill before you have time to use the scroll, which does involve opting whether or not to use it, and then deciding whether to come back to life where you were killed or back in town and clicking appropriately, then you are, basically, messed up.  I still have the scroll active for use next time, and being resurrected by a healer meant losing less actual experience (about 1% instead of 2%, assuming the healer had the Resurrection skill at level five), but losing that many points in one go, well, I don't want it to happen too often.  Usually healers are slow to use Res as it takes a lot of mana, and has to be done at close range, so generally you have to wait until the fight is over.  I'll be sure to make sure anyone with a suitable scroll active has time to use it, when I'm the one who's alive, in future.

A New Week Begins

As usual on a Wednesday, I had to log out early, but SirDarth had a busy time working on the blue horse for Kaerella, which levelled up fairly early in the morning to 26, and later reached level 27.  By the end of the evening, in fact, the horse had actually reached level 28, so things are moving along pretty well there.

Although the actual Saint Patrick's Day was yesterday, the new week's theme, for the Item mall, is "St Patty", for packages of experience boosters, skill exp boosters, moonstones, resurrection scrolls, item drop boosters, lucky draw boxes, heaven stones, "2fers" on the Runes of Protection I and II, pet boxes, and more - there is even, as usual, one that would cost about $150's worth of aeria points, with 30 lucky smelting stones and a lot more, though it seems a bit mean to only include one chaos smelting stone.

The cheap (99 ap) "St Patty: Shots!" package just includes one berserker potion and two power potions, so is quite good value - the idea is that the server that buys the most of that package gets a whole 24 hours of double experience, skill exp and pet experience on Saturday 28th.  I doubt if Auzura has a chance of winning, but if Cariae does I guess I'll be over on that server for the appropriate time.

Kaerella did some mining today while Darth was pet-levelling, though just before lunch Stavanic was in touch, asking if SirPerivale could put in an appearance, as he wanted to move a pet between two of his characters.  He also needed to promote Peri to Guild Advisor in his DeathBringers guild, so that his new rogue could join the guild.  As it was just about lunchtime by then, I didn't have time to switch back to Kae, so Peri did some pet-levelling on his horse over lunch.  I got rid of the bloodseals from his gloves after the third one had been added, using a purification gem - but then with the next set, again one of the seals added to Peri's strength, so that again his bare-handed hitting went up from 26 to 28.

After lunch Kaerella returned, and went out to the Giants again; I moved the spot she teleports to a bit further west, so that she can also easily reach the Akane Giants, which are just one level higher, but the idea of farming some armour there just doesn't work for me, all they ever drop is gold, or maybe a moonstone box.  So I moved across to the Elite Frenzied Berserkers in Merac.

I'd opened the last ten Experience Boxes that Kae had in storage, but none of them gave me a platinum blessed iris, or even a non-platinum one - instead it was mainly small and medium elixirs and potions.  They all add 30% to the experience gain, which is hardly as dramatic as the 200% a "pbi" adds, but it helps a bit; I used a one-hour one with the EFBs, which helped along the afternoon's experience gain a bit.  The descriptions of the time these things last isn't always clear, as 72 hours of "game time" is the equivalent of 3 hours by my watch, and I don't know how well they "stack" with other things, or whether, like the pbi, they keep on counting their time down even when the character is offline.  It doesn't seem possible to sell them, anyway, so I may as well experiment.

An NPC in Merac's village, Armour Trader Clain, gave me a quest to collect five Spiked Canine Skins, so a trip to Maagadum Jail was necessary.  I used the horse buffs to get me through level one and down to level two, and got the skins from the first room there before too long, from Spiked Canines and Dire Spiked Canines, and killed some Beast Archers and Beast Scythes as well, but didn't stay all that long. I returned to Merac Caron by a scroll of recall, and got my reward of 550,000 experience and five moonstones, before heading back to the EFBs once more.

There is a special co-offer with FilePlanet at the moment, which is worded rather as if one has to make a new FilePlanet and/or Last Chaos account, but in fact all one needs to do is go to the page recommended in the "events" section, while logged in at FilePlanet, get a key code there, and enter it back at the Last Chaos site, specifying which server your package should be sent to.  The package arrived almost instantly - 20 each of the experience and skill exp boosters, 30 item drop boosters, a platinum super skill pill, a platinum adrenaline, and a "Great HP + MP Boost" (which increases one's maximum health and mana by 30% for a day, starting from when the item is moved into one's inventory probably) is a nice bonus to get for so little effort.

The evening session was a bit short, but did involve the Elite Frenzied Berserkers again, though the day's total experience gain was only 20.16%, plus 49 skill points and 1472 pet points.  Still, it gets us a quarter of the way through level 42.  Now, we just need BasheR to make a good Tomb or Demon party, with room for Kaerella, before he gets too many levels ahead.

Tuesday Continuations

I didn't have as much playing time today, as I'd decided to go and see the new Watchmen movie - very impressive!  That took the place of my afternoon session.entirely, seeing that it is rather long.

Before that, however, the first thing to report was that MistressDomino had a successful night selling stuff, and indeed sold out of everything she was carrying except for Myst Eyes, where only two of the twenty I'd put up sold.  Half a million seemed to me to be their usual price, as people need them for one of the quests to make a "new" pet, but at 450,000 only the two went.

I didn't really have huge numbers of most things, so it wasn't the biggest ever overnight total, but 33 heaven stones at 645,000 each was a solid basis.  So Kaerella ought now to be able to afford some 45/47 armour, if I can actually find some.  I suppose an alternative would be to find someone selling lucky smelting stones at a slightly below average price, and buy enough to upgrade her 40/42 set from +4 to +6, it might well work out cheaper, and would probably out-perform a new +4 set.

SirDarth did some useful levelling of the blue horse, starting suitably early in the morning; there was one dodgy moment though, when I looked over to that secondary screen to see around three Blood Frenzies also attacking, aggressive types that they are - someone had taken the trouble to lure them from where they are, around the corner.  As it happens they attacked the horse rather than SirDarth, and pets do lose health when attacked only by one point at a time, so I was able to run for it, and unequip the horse, so that they lost interest.  The horse had lost 15% of his health.

That health loss was made up when the horse later levelled to 25.  A few minutes later I saw a red-named knight, Bucephalus I think his name was, run up and attack Darth's Berserker, to try and sabotage his pet-levelling, though he ran off when he saw I was alert.  Given the timing, I assume that he was the one who lured the Blood Frenzies.

Darth also lost a little time when the Berserker he was fighting went so far up the steep roadside that Darth couldn't follow, which was strange, but it was probably less than a minute before I noticed, and transferred Darth's attentions to a different target.  Darth had the afternoon off as well, as I was going to be away from the computer for just a little bit too long.  After four hours and twenty minutes the horse would have starved, his degree of sympathy would have started to fall, the armour buff Darth relies on would also have started to fall, and Darth could well have died.  Once I was home though, the levelling restarted, and the horse was a good way into level 25 by the end of the day.

I'd been meaning to get restocked on critical potions, which increase the chance of a critical hit, and make an archer a pretty deadly fighter, particularly if combined with adrenaline for extra speed.  If anyone sells them in merchant mode, they seem to be at least 2.5 million each; a pack of five "large crits" costs 170 aeria points.  For an hour this evening there was a special offer, so that if one spent 599 ap on a "Party Cube Slayer" package, which included 5 large crits, plus 5 platinum adrenalines, 5 berserker potions, and 5 health stealers, one would be given free a "Guild Cube Slayer" package, normally 999 ap, with 10 of each of those, plus 35 chaos balls - so that, given the value of the crits, everything else was practically free...well, 89 ap anyway.  So, I spent my points, and got my reward.

Today was St Patrick's Day; last year, Last Chaos did use that as a bit of a theme for the week, with a special cheap package of items including a green pet colouring crystal, and a mass rally of people with green pets - that was when, over on the Cariae server, Keerella's drake, Greedo, got his green colour!  This year the only mention of the day was an hour-long chance to buy one green pet colouring crystal and get a second one free...

Well, Kaerella did manage to fit in some quality time with the Elite Frenzied Berserkers in the morning, adding 18.47% and 43 skill points; in the evening, Kae went there again, as well as visiting level two of Maargadum Jail for a while.  I can't claim that it was a very long or intense session, but it got Kae up to level 42, which, while it left her one point short on the Constitution she needs for her next passive skill, meant she could at least learn the second levels of Master Armoursmith and Master Weaponsmith, for 345 skill points each.  So those points have now been invested.  

By the end of the evening, the total experience gain for the day was 39.15%, plus 97 skill points - or, with that 690 used, minus 593 I suppose.  Kae's drake SirFrancis had indeed reached level 28 before lunch, as expected.  With 24 levels of Increased Armour he now adds 190 to Kae's defence - and 8 to her attack, from 4 levels of Increased Power.  Well, it all helps.

Monday Explorations

After getting rid of Kaerella's heavier pieces of loot, some shopping was indulged in - and I found a 40/42 armour set being offered for sale for 10,222,000 gold by a knight called NoGiveFace.  It was quite a mixture, with sorcerer, titan, knight, rogue and healer parts, with a +3 and a +1 piece, so it was no huge bargain, but it seemed like a good idea to get it anyway - while Kae may not use it for long, there should be other characters following after who'll make better use of it.

After getting Collector Ryu to make it all into the healer Dawn set, I used twelve heaven stones to get it all up to +3 - at that point Kae's defence, with SirFrancis not equipped, was 550, 4 less than her old "Goddess" 30/32 set, though of course that is generally +7, with one +8 piece, the shirt.  Moving the new armour up to +4 got the total up to 570, which is at least a slight improvement; I've so far resisted the temptation to take it to +5 or +6, as that would rather deplete my stock of lucky smelting stones.

The only other character on the same account, on the Auzura server, as Kaerella is a mage called Hazel; as she wouldn't be affected by the Strayana virus, she went over there to buy some larger mana potions for Kae - but I noticed after that that she still had some time left on old "Blessed Rewards" from when Auzura was the "Recommended" server, so I quickly took her out of Randol to make use of the extra skill and experience they offered.  Hazel was level 2 - the first thing I attacked was actually a Pandora's Box, and "killing" that immediately put her up by two levels.  A level 20 Pandora Beast was released, which I avoided fighting, I just killed some foxes and wolves, and had reached level six by the time the boosts ran out.

In the late morning Kae went out to those Elite Frenzied Berserkers in Merac again, and went up about 9% in experience.   The two groups of two fairly close together do just about respawn in time to keep a player busy; having the horse buffs is definitely a good idea, as they are protective, so that sometimes two rush in together, or a nearby Highlander joins in.

 After lunch, Kae tried level two of the Jail again, but didn't get any good drops, and, after finding that there were other people trying to farm the EFBs, headed to Dratan and the Giants instead, using quite a few of the medium-size mana pots Hazel had purchased, so that she could use Slow Shot most of the time.  This added around 12% in all, with again no useful drops.  Since it was the right direction, I did take the opportunity to ride over to the entrance to the Tomb of Theos.  Luckily I do know the way pretty well now, having taken quite a few characters there over on the Cariae server; while Giants and Golems may hit out at a rider as she passes, the only dangerous bit is riding through the Masters of Secret Technique, who as well as a physical attack do have magical skills.  It's best to have a health potion of two ready for that part.

So, the afternoon was fairly varied, adding about 12% and another 31 skill points, though not, it must be admitted, hugely productive.

I had switched the blue horse over to SirDarth, and at level 22 it gave him enough of a buff to be able to fight the Berserkers without his health bar fluctuating too wildly, most of the time - acccessories giving defence, dexterity and evasion helped, too.  I used a "purification gem" to clear the bloodseals from SirPerivale's gauntlets, which with a "four strength" seal had increased his unarmed attack by two, and gingerly used a new set of bloodseal gems.  However, the second bloodseal gem added a six strength seal, so once the third seal is used I'll have to use another purification gem and try again...

The evening was, generally, Kae versus the Elite Frenzied Berserkers, adding 20.46% without any boosts.  I do have a three-hour, double experience Blessed Iris in stock, maybe I should think about using that before too long.  Another 46 skill points got added too.

I did do a bit more window-shopping, but there isn't a whole lot of stuff around, partly because a lot of items had been put into the Merchant House system, which has been temporarily removed, so that the items are just not available, to buyers or sellers.  Ratel did ask me to return to town at one stage because he had spotted a bargain, a level 35/37 +4 mage set for two million, and wanted to borrow the money.  I teleported back, and, as he was changing characters rather slowly, bought the armour, and traded it across to him when he got there.  Hopefully he had enough gold to get Collector Ryu to convert it for knightly use.

It seems that he isn't too keen on carrying large amounts of skill points out of Prokion Temple, and would rather have mini-freezes every time he needs skill points for a new skill.  I do hope that he will compromise a bit, and at least let his healer character, Jacqueline, collect her sp in Prokion...

The Aeria people seem to have been a bit low-profile today; there was something wrong with the website in the morning, all I could get was Google's cache of it, and the "news" part of the start-up screen was on its default ("Last Chaos beta launched")...but at least the game was working!  There was apparently a demonstration last night on the Katar server, with people using their "merchant mode" signs to protest about recent changes and problems.  I wondered why there were in-game announcements asking them to move to an out-of-the-way location "to avoid lag" - in the end the GMs kicked them all from the server, the in-game equivalent of using tear gas and not exactly a tactful way to address the game's difficulties and the grievances some people have.

By the end of the evening Kaerella had gone up from a quarter of the way into level 41 to two-thirds of the way through; her drake SirFrancis ought to level up tomorrow to level 28, with any luck.  SirDarth did good work on the blue horse, getting it to level 24 by the end of the evening.  Even at level 23, though, with 22 levels of Armour Increase, the health bar did go down a bit sometimes.  It just shows how much harder the monsters are hitting now... and means no more overnight pet levelling, as now by the time that the horse has enough levels to allow SirDarth to work with a Berserker without the risk of dying, the horse is starting to get through quality stones too quickly for 100 starvation points to last for the eight hours needed.

Ratel thinks that may be deliberate, and it is certainly likely to drive up the price of horses, for people who buy them rather than train up their own.  Maybe I'll eventually make one for sale, if the price gets tempting enough, and spend the proceeds on upgrading Darth's armour a bit.  Hmm, I wonder if anyone will be selling a level 25 Royal Shield +15 then...?