Warrior gets the nod

BLM:68 WHM:54 Summoner: 32 WAR:56 THF:70

I had planned to get an XBOX and play Oblivion for a while during the time I spent looking for groups(lfg) to party with. My WAR/THF is clearly the slowest of my characters to get invites now. But he isn't gimp by any means. I have his Royal Chainmail and Darksteel Claymore +1 all in tow. I have a stack of Bream Sushi in reserve as well and I am saving the Sole Sushi +1 that Inverno gave me to use with my WAR in a party since it will help him the most.

I sent a lot of pictures to my mailbox and lost a lot of them probably because I sent them too fast. It's frustrating to lose so much hard work in so short a time.

I need to find some time to get my BLM leveled up to 70 so that I have no more excuse to put off my Maat fight with THF. I am so lackadaisical sometimes. If LB4 wasn't so easy, I probably would still be level 65.

I have worked recently to get my Leviathan avatar quest opened. I really want to get him done and get Fenrir out of the way. I was lucky to hear from Shanisasha that the Yagudo Necklaces quest in Windy Woods is solely for the purpose of Norg fame, which is where the Leviathan quest is opened. I spent 2 full days almost buying up Yag Necklaces and farming in Giddeus. With luck, tonight someone will be doing Leviathan.

I have several stories to tell about my recent missions in COP which are many and I used to have a lot of pictures all set to go, but I lost them. I will have to find them somehow from my trash bin and resucitate them for use again.

Blogger is also messed up for my other computer, so now I am required to do my updates at the desk instead of in my room. It's all for the best though since it is much easier to type at the desk than with a cordless keyboard.

Norton Antivirus sucks. Don't ever buy it. I had McAfee Antivirus and thought well maybe cuz Norton is more well known they would be less "update-demanding" than McAfee. I was wrong.

The most ANNOYING thing in the world is working well with your party and getting ready to ship off and get a quest done and suddenly BAM, a pop-up from your very own Antivirus software has kicked you out of full screen mode and kicked you out of the game. I eventually learned how to bypass this with McAfee but with Norton I haven't got it yet. What's worse is that this new virus has come onto my new computer and started messing with the font. Since I haven't been on any porn sites or musicmatch BS raggedy websites that started up yesterday, I know that Norton themselves must be "insisting" that I update my Virus Protection for a nice fat fee.

Promyvion OH!

BLM:68 WHM:54 Summoner: 32 WAR:56 THF:70

Today was the magic day. I tried to get Promyvion-Mea done with my pals but lost the first time. We went with me as a SMN, Taria as a WAR and Nomadic as another WAR and everyone else was pickup. We had SMN WHM WAR WAR BLM WAR. The last WAR was Nomadic who I helped with winning the thing but we spent a lot of time farming animas and getting everyone some animas to throw at the thing to affect it.

People that don't farm animas to get Promyvion-Mea done don't wanna win it that badly and you really are gonna need the secret weapon out there to offset the boss's favorite word... CHEESE! Ya that's right it's CHEESE!

The boss doesn't care if you have been nice to people in your linkshell, he doesn't care if you show up everyday to talk and joke with your linkshell mates, he wouldn't give a rat's ass to hear you say /hello, he wants you dead and he's gonna use AOE Carousel 2 to 3 times in row and do 150 dmg, each time, at level 30, to all of you, even though you are able to may hit for 120 from a weaponskill. That's Cheese.

Animas are anti-cheese. Depending on the anima you can stop the boss from moving, stop it from using AOE effects, and even stop it from using special attacks. It's in your best interest to farm. If you lose the Promy, the best thing you can do is quit. go farm for an hour and prepare to get up there again and be there 2 hours later, it will probably take you that long to get those things all done.

Anyway getting back to the point, we WON the Promyvion finally. I got Taria and Daftorious their access to Lufaise Meadows and we did it all due to Shanisasha who was a BIG help and wonderful through and through.

Usually I add a sidecrack at this point but nah. Blogger is having problems prob due to a virus I am having with the date. See you next time.

Streetlamp in Bibiki Bay

BLM:68 WHM:54 Summoner: 32 WAR:56 THF:70

I have recently spent a lot of time leveling my BLM relative to my THF and feel that perhaps it is best to make my BLM my main after it hits 70. On the other hand, the linkshell already has a lot of 75 BLMs and could probably use a 75 THF more. Tough call. I am gonna have to put off spending too much on BLM for the time being. I really want to get my Penitent's Rope and Black Cloak too, but it's not necessary. I do a pretty good job with just your basic AF gear.

This picture is of the Catoblepas camp in Bibiki Bay at dusk. It kind of looks like a streetlamp is lighting the way huh?

Summoner gags himself

BLM:68 WHM:54 Summoner: 31 WAR:56 THF:70

I leveled with Uchipu recently as THF and I got this shot of her in her "hoodie".

Why would I subject myself to a Promyvion-Mea mission again? Well, if Taria hadn't stood up and sed Hohito let's do your ZM5 Notorious Monsters so you will be ready to go with us to do ZM6, I probably would not have volunteered to help. But as it stands I now have learned SO much about this particular Promy that I want to help EVERY SINGLE person in the linkshell, that I have known for a while, get this stupid thing done.

More importantly, I MUST get these people through this horrible experience, through to victory.

We went the first time with some Animas in hand. Shanisasha helped a great deal by knowing the way and taking us through the steps and making sure we always moved with FULL mp. We got to the boss fight with almost no trouble. The fight itself was a different story. I was WHM that time and we almost made it, but at a critical moment in the game I needed to cast Benediction and had just used Divine Seal and didn't want to waste that so I casted a Cure spell and then the thing killed me without me getting to use my 2HR. It was almost dead too. This was a very close battle and we only had 5 animas.

The second time, Shani didn't want to come again and she was SMN and since I have a SMN I took mine. But I haven't leveled SMN in 3 months and am really very out of practice. I have been enjoying BLM lately and even using WHM was something that took getting used to. We farmed animas for a long while and it was really kind of peaceful farming in there and killing mobs even without a WHM. Easy fights. 5 of us, each got 2 animas each and when I sent a shout for a WHM I put the message in there that we had 10 animas to use. I got 3 /tells just like that in the next 3 minutes, but I answered the first one and it was a JP person. Unaffected, I invited her and told the others politely that we were full.

I felt good but earlier that day me and Taria had a bit of a discussion about lending gil. Many courtesies in life are in fact opportunites that can be exploited for straight profit. Lending gil is one. One of the WARs had leveled THF as a sub but we all knew that having a NIN sub would be far more useful in the Promy fight, so she conviced him to level NIN to 15. Then he told her that he didn't have the gil for Utsusemi: Ichi which was selling for 600k and that there was no way that he would be able to complete the quest that afternoon. Well then Taria sends a tell in the ls asking for contributions to help him get the scroll. I gave my comment that I didn't approve of asking for gil but was happy after she was able to buy the scroll and get him his Blinks for Promy. I felt bad later that I had disagreed with her but it wasn't like I was mad.

Anyway, after all this effort on her part, including farming and leveling her NIN and using Hi potions and throwin all her Animas at the thing. We lost the Promy.

There were 3 WARs Thimien Llessur and Taria. They even set up a voking order which I thought would have been great if I was WHM but I was SMN. Daftorious was the RNG. His wide scan ability really made getting to the Memory Receptacles easy. Plus, he was usually able to one-shot the Strays which I thought was VERY efficient. All sed and done we did a great job of getting to the boss.

This time, as we did the last time, we planned to just run through the third level and follow Shani's advice and sick Carby on the one monster that prob would get in our way that was large, and just high-tail it to the zone. It worked like a charm. Everyone that does this Promy should fight to the memory receptacles but just haul butt when it comes to getting to the boss zone. That level is just too packed with monsters to allow you to fight even a single monster in peace.

The boss fight made me nervous though. I knew that I hadn't learned Shani's method of getting off 3 Astral Flow BPs in one fight. I also didn't have a macro designed for it yet. I also figured that they would need me to not use up all my MP too soon so that the BPs would have enough MP to go off when needed. We start the fight and everything is going well. The mob is stable and the WARs aren't taking too much damage. I cast Paralyze and Dia but suddenly it occurs to me that summoning the avatar too soon may get the avatar killed so I decide to just cure for a while. Then something happens to one of the melee and the WHM draws aggro, I am thinking of summoning the avatar at this point but instead I start to cure and backup the WHM. I continue to cure using Cure Is so as not to draw the monster to me since I needed my MP for the BP. Then BAM, we lose Thimien. I continue to cure. I keep the WARs alive but it seems that we aren't going to win the fight this time and I start to wonder, since I used my Reraise earring, if maybe I should save my 2hr for the next fight. I hesitate, but then Taria dies and Llessur dies. I am sure that we arent gonna make it with 1 rng and 2 mages trying to kill the Delver that still has 50% of its HP left. So I tell them that we should die and just try to kill it next time but then Taria asks if I had used my 2 hr and suddenly I feel guilty for not having already used it. They had used their reraise earring and raise but were running around weakened trying to dmg it, hoping that their SMN would blast it soon. But there was noone left to take hits. Soon they go down, I use my 2 hr but in the middle of struggling to get the command off, I die. I hadn't used my animas, hadn't used my 2hr even once and had almost a full MP bar showing, making me look probably like the King of Fools at a fag party.

It was a disgrace. I was disgusted.

Llessur disbanded without a word. Daftorious wondered in ls how the mob could kill us with 10 animas and a SMN 2hr used and I had to expain. Taria was speechless but soon logged out after. Thimien was kind, but of course thought that this Promy was the worst part of the game ever made. The JP Whm was the only one left in party with me and Thim and she asked if we were going again and I explained "/no". She was fine but I'm sure she was dissapointed as well. She had even used 2 animas during the fight that I didn't know she had

I had to go crawl under a Weeper and bloodport home. Uchipu came on and I wanted to spill my guts to her and beg her to help us, but it was just, just, .. it was time to log and go get a beer.

I spent a good deal of time planning on how we would get the thing done next time, but I wonder how long it will take for these wounds to heal.

Missions Impossible

BLM:68 WHM:54 Summoner: 32 WAR:56 THF:70

Missions are very hard to organize. VERY HARD. People are gonna die; people have to be from a certain nation and be on a certain mission and they always better be ready to spend 3 hours at least getting to the end.

I spent a lot of time yesterday doin the Chains of Promathia(COP) Mission 2-3. This is the one that has the minotaur boss near the end of the fight. It was weird that we won the way we did but hey I don't care how ugly the method, I can now continue to the next mission. I will write more about that later. People sometimes abbreviate COP missions as PM so if you see PM or COP, it means the same thing. Completing PM missions eventually gives you access to SEA. It's an area that is bought and paid for with the COP expansion.

Today, I spent working on killing Notorious Monsters(NM) in Ifrit's Cauldron. It was a long journey and most people agree that this is the toughest of the NMs to complete for this mission. This NM is for the Zilart Mission(ZM) 5. After you complete it you can go on to ZM6 and ZM7 and on until you get past ZM13, which is when you will get SKY access. I don't know what that is yet but it's probably a whole new area that was made available when the Zilart expansion came out.

The Bastok Missions are similar in that they give you access to better and better equipment through the use of Conquest Points(CP). If you are wonderin what all those crystals are that are dropping from monsters and don't know why sometimes there are NONE, it's because you forgot to get signet. If you don't get signet, you forego having crystals drop and this keeps your kills from mattering in the regional update. This also keeps you from earning any CP and this means you can't buy the items offered by your nation through the signet guy.

Some of these items are very useful. In fact some sell for more than 100k each, so not clicking signet at the start of any party is like well... it's LIKE OMGa!

Buildin a party soon?

BLM:67 WHM:54 Summoner: 32 WAR:56 THF:70

Building parties takes a lot of patience and drive. Sometimes I find people's lack of faith in waiting for appropriate party members disturbing.

In building a partyI use these basic rules for party setup: One tank, one healer, one puller and the rest DDs. This is for partys before 41. After 41, if you don't have a Bard or an RDM in there, you are gonna be hurting the exp bonus, and frankly you will see many Rank 10 ppl just plain not wanna pt and find something else to do. Bards and Red Mages help the party by providing MP regeneration, which allows the toll on mp to be less and pulling to go faster. A smart WHM will usually give the puller the option of pulling when he's at like 130 or so. And with a backup healer you can use the mp of the backup as a buffer when deciding when to pull. OK, getting off the subject here.

For the tank, you need to have his or her level be the highest. That armor is going up against the monsters hits and if it is higher level armor, along with higher level VIT from the tank having a higher level, you will be doing the party a huge favor by starting with just that simple little fact.

Next, make the pullers level also the highest. He is the one that is gonna be checking the con of the mobs and if, like me, he adds up the mobs in his head and sets them up ahead of time, he can save the really tough ones for chain 3 or 4 or even 5 as is convenient. If you get a podunk Thief at the lower levels trying to pull IT++ mobs that he doesn't know are actually IT ++++, you will be doing the party a huge disservice that will become quite possibly the puller's biggest blunder of his career, but actually it was yours.

The next guy that needs to be of a higher level is the BLM. He is your main source of damage. If he is gettnig resisted left and right, the loss in damage to the party is catastrophic compared to the damage lost to melees who may be missing more at the same level. A BLM getting his MB resisted is to a party what using a blunt sword in battle is to a fighter.

The rest is filling. Melees can be helped with Frost and Dia to allow them to hit more, esp if there is a Bard in the party, so whatever level for them is fine. Mages heal for almost the same total no matter what level they are so having a really low level WHM or RDM or BRD doesn't matter too much since they are mostly support jobs.

Finally, these are guidelines. If it's late and you can't find anybody, any level PLD will do and will probably be a better choice than say getting a high level SAM to tank. Actually, I was recently in a party with 2 BLMs and WHM and no RDM and we were still doin chain 4s and 5s pretty often, so it really does mostly depend on the people and on if you got party members that are having a good time.

Black Mage thoughts

BLM:67 WHM:54 Summoner: 32 WAR:56 THF:70

I have a new love for BLM now. But there are several big reasons that BLMs love their Ice Staves and Distortion. One, it adds Elemental Skill +10 bonus which makes a monster ability to resist your spells less. This only works however if you have the staff equipped. So if they are doing a Fragmentation skillchain and you are MBing with Thunder, you give up Elemental Skill by trading to a Thunder Staff, which will make your Thunder spells more effective but maybe not stick so much. So sticking to the Ice Staff is preferable.

Also, since the Ice Staff casts Blizzard spells more effectively, casting Aero spells with that staff are less effective. BASTWF is the elemental circle key that I use to remember the order. It sounds like "BASTok WtF". Blizzard Aero Stone Thunder Water Fire are the names. It's confusing when they say Lightning and Wind and then always say Fire for Fire. These are the names of the spells so I stick to remembering this representation of the circle.

Thirdly, you lose +4 INT when you switch to a Thunder Staff. It's a big hit to take in INT when you are fighting IT mobs and esp if you are at the low end of the party level which usually tends to be the case if the party is set up right. More on party setup in future journals. So if you plan on using ANY other staff with your MBs, it's almost stupid to not use Burn before you MB.

Well this is a problem cuz how many BLMs out there have seen TP 95% and started to cast Burn only to miss your MB with your big spell? Ya just as I thought, all of you. I can still catch the MB in time and MB with like a Blizzaga or something (because casting time is shorter) but man you just wasted casting a Burn that would have for sure doubled your damage from doing a pathetic Blizzaga. So usually I add a "call" to my Burn macro just to give them a heads up on HEY BLM OVER HERE WOULD LIKE TO MB WITH SOME GA III SPELLS [Can I have it?]

So, this is why you will see a BLM wince ( or /no emote ) when people call out a Detonation skillchain, because they gotta give up their Ice Staff to do their MBs effectively. If they do, I just pull out my Rose Wand+1(+6 INT) and use that with my Dark Staff instead.

In sum, a Distortion skillchain, on a mob that is weak to Ice, while equipped with your Ice Staff, equals Blizzaga II goodness that is really quite efficient on MP or Waterga III meanness if you happen to be on chain 4 and have been really responsible with saving enough MP for the BIG HIT on the final 2 or 3 mobs of the chain.

I have a story to tell about some people that were telling me that their skillchain was doing more damage than my MB because they had chosen a Detonation skillchain that used Spinning Slash, but I will save it since I gotta go to work.