Dynamis-San d'Oria Interloper

Tonight

This uber-orc likes to charm people.

was my first trip into Dynamis, the dreary alternate-reality version of Van'diel where Lv. 70+ characters go to die... and die... and die. It's the only bit of endgame which intrigues me. The linkshell -- a branch of The Nameless called lolDynamis -- doesn't charge an entry fee because they keep the money to pay for the hourglass and upgrade relic weapons.

We gathered in San d'Oria at 7 p.m., but we didn't get around to entering the place until closer to 8. I had tried to read up on it, but nothing can really prepare you for how crazy and fast-paced it can be.

The zone starts at the South San d'Oria entrance and ends with a boss fight near the chocobo stables behind the auction house. It's a very short walk in the normal world, but Dynamis is swarming with monsters which attack in large trains that have to be slept and killed off one-by-one. It's completely insane.

I was the healer in a melee group consisting of some thieves and a Red Mage. I had fun trying to keep up with them, slapping cures and regens as needed, renewing buffs when some idiotic mob did an AoE dispel move. I didn't have anything approaching a working Haste cycle for this one, but I'm sure I'll get better after a few more runs.

Dynamis

Sometimes gargoyles get pissed.

is timed, but you can get extensions by killing the NMs. At one point Cythe had all the mages line up across a passageway so he could tank one of the mobs at the edge of their nuking range while the melees remained far in the back. They completely vaporized the monster. It was wild.

We had a wipeout near the chocobo stables when we were overwhelmed by monsters. One of the NMs used an AoE charm spell which had me and several other people rushing around killing members of the alliance. I got a skillup when I whacked someone with my Light Staff before we all regained control and died. The mages reraised and started getting everyone on their feet as quickly as possible.

One reason why Dynamis is so popular is the chance for a piece of relic artifact armor. In my case, I was after the White Mage piece called "Cleric's Cap." It dropped off a mob, and I lotted for it. Suddenly I was bombarded with /tells from people wishing me luck. When I won the lot, I started getting a slew of /tells congratulating me. Then I started getting another batch joking "Now you have to level WHM!" I can't wear the piece until Lv. 72.

We took out the boss and Neyla pointed me to the ??? on the ground that you have to click on to get it to count as a win. We ran out of time before we could kill some other NM roaming around in there. Next Saturday they're planning to do Dynamis-Windurst. Seeing a nightmare version of my beloved hometown is very, very tempting.

Neyla

Neyla and I celebrate with more Ninja and Dragoon goodness.

and I celebrated by switching over to Ninja and Dragoon and running around the canyon and Buburimu for awhile. We were slaughtering everything that moved in the canyon, but we focused on bunnies on the Bubu side. I think we're going to duo to 18 and then hit Valkurm Dunes.

Dragoon is growing on me. I don't see it ever becoming a major job, but it's something I can play with and solo when I get bored. I owe one to Dagry for giving me a powerlevel this morning, curing me so I could chew through easy prey mobs with no downtime. He wanted me to do Toughs, but it's faster xp to kill three or four easies in the time it takes to do that.

Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem Dry Bones...

Today, adventuring with Quieren and other members of the CoP group, was my first visit to the Sacrarium. It's dark, dry and depressing, with several long-abandoned and haunted classrooms. The hallways are crawling with fomors and undead. Everyone's favorite True Sight monsters, the taurus, roam the hallways. To add to the fun, the maze has walls which shift around every game day.

The flow of the mission goes like this: Enter the Sacrarium, farm two Coral Crest Keys from the fomors, obtain a Sealion Crest Key from an NM named Keremet, use the keys to enter a section of the Sacrarium for a cutscene, and then clear all fomor hate before finding and defeating a ghostly NM named old Professor Mariselle for a key item, and then using the keys again to get the final cutscene. Easy, right?

We had few problems getting the keys off the fomors, and we even managed to get a few subligars to drop. We had a Red Mage Fomor link at one point and we got blood aggro from a mummy, but otherwise it wasn't too bad. The hard part was defeating Keremet.

There

I really hate this bony bastard.

are two hallways leading into his room, and each hallway has six skeletons which guard him. They don't link or aggro -- even if you're in the red or are resting in front of them -- until you attack Keremet himself. They're also so pathetically weak I could've killed them all if I'd had my hammer. Andreva was there as Monk and mowed through them.

So we pulled Keremet and managed to get him down to about 15% of his life before he wiped us out. He uses some nasty spells if you give him a chance, and he's also fond of charming members of the party and making them attack the others. I had to sleep the charmed person until they regained control and could be safely awakened.

He stalked back into his room, so I reraised and got us back on our feet while Andreva homepointed to Windurst to fertilize some plants. While we waited, we were joined by a Summoner who was in the area to get the map. Astral Flow sounded like a great idea.

Andreva died trying to get back to us, but we decided to try it with the Summoner. The fight was largely a repeat of the first. Keremet charmed me at one point and I started whacking away at Truegrave (PLD) for 2 damage. It was cute and non-threatening except for the part where nobody was healing. I was fine after that but Hayatox was charmed and killed me before I could sleep him. Wipeout again.

We retrieved Andreva, waited a few minutes until everyone's two-hours were available again, and pulled Keremet a third time. That time we won with minimal damage (I got the Sealion Key, which means I never have to fight that skeletal fuck again). We got our cutscene, but Truegrave had to log out to go to class. We're going to track down the ghost and kill it on Tuesday.

Daring Dragoon

Neyla's Ninja is coming along nicely, and we started off the day by going after a Gasson katana. It's a Rare/Ex drop from the Chocobo Leech in Dangruf Wadi, which I'd killed once before with Feriz. We first had to club a dozen sheep on the hill outside South Gustaberg to get some blood to drop, and then we headed inside to pop the leech and get the weapon.

I

Crawler silk is a nice bit of income while leveling in West Sarutabaruta

mostly ran around West Sarutabaruta for awhile on Dragoon, killing crawlers, bees and yagudo. Of all the lowbie zones, I like Sarutabaruta best because you can sell the beehive chips and silk threads at the Auction House for a nice profit. Oboro saved my butt once or twice out there by using Healing Breath and also by unexpectedly curing my poison, but I was rarely in danger.

I switched back to White Mage and hit the glacier for an hour or so of catching Emperor Fish. They're still holding steady at 15k each and sell quickly, so another batch after these will give me enough to repay Nicolette's loan.

Neyla wanted a Boomerang to practice throwing skills, but we couldn't find any in the Auction House. Then I looked at the actual recipe and realized I could make one. I bought the ingredients and went charging off (with Neyla in tow) to the Woodworker's Guild in San d'Oria to get one of those special crystals. I HQ'd the recipe and handed Neyla a signed Boomerang+1.

"That's a keeper," he said.

The Savage

Quieren's loose Chains of Promathia static (which he's dubbed "LOLCoP") gathered at the Tavnazian Safehold for the fight against a wyrm named Ouryu. This one has a cap of Lv. 50, so I was happy to have some of my better spells available again.

I

Hippogryphs drop tailfeathers vital to the fight against Ouryu.

was there as White Mage, Quieren and Asmodius were Black Mages, Andreva came as Bard, and Reko and Hyatox came as Rangers.

Before we could fight Ouryu, we spent an hour or two farming hippogryph tailfeathers in Cape Riverne Site A-01. Two tailfeathers are required to obtain one Mistmelt, and item which forces Ouryu to land when he takes to the air.

We ran from area to area killing them until we had enough tailfeathers to make seven mistmelts. Most of the guides we checked advised taking at least five, but we had time because Reko was asked to tank Ouryu for Onaule and Caerloc's crew as Ninja. The rest of us returned to the Safehold to get our Mistmelts in order.

We made our way through Riverne Site B-01 and got to the uncapped area called Monarch Linn. Reko was already there, waiting for Onaule and the rest. It led to some awkward silences when they arrived because Quieren and Caerloc parted on bad terms, but we waited patiently while they did the fight and won. They tried to get Reko to join them for the Sacrarium, but he declined to tank for us.

Ouryu

Ouryu is large and intimidating... but not too difficult to kill.

is an awesome sight, the sort of thing which could almost inspire you to jump into the HNM lifestyle. The strategy we used was to have our Bard and Black Mages keep him asleep as much as possible and then use Freeze on him while Reko tanked and Hyatox unloaded on him. I kept Barstonra going (Ouryu loves his Stone-based spells) and kept him silenced and paralyzed.

We worked him slow and steady, taking time to rest MP as needed while he was asleep. He would fly into the air every so often, but the Mistmelts brought him crashing to the ground to be slept again. He never used any of his really bad AoE attacks, so we got lucky there. The entire fight took us about sixteen minutes.

After taking a break and then getting my cutscenes for the next mission, I returned to Windurst and switched over to Dragoon. Neyla has been leveling Ninja and wants a reliable tanking partner for the dunes. I'm going to level Dragoon to 15 to catch up with him. Once we reach 20 I'll continue as his tanking partner on my Warrior job since I'll need to get it to 37 as well.

I had planned to rename my wyvern, but after tonight's bonding experience I can't bring myself to do it. Playing Beastmaster and Summoner and now Dragoon has spoiled me where pets are concerned. My little Oboro gets to keep her identity.

Back to Uggalepih

Today was rank mission day, and Neyla and I started it out by taking Windaria (Red Mage) through the BCNM yagudo fight in Giddeus. The yagudo must have long memories, because they've obviously been working out and getting in shape for the next time we popped in there. The bastards were on steroids and made the fight a living hell from which we had to flee twice before we managed to take them down.

We had a pretty nice turnout for these missions tonight. Neyla and I were there, of course. We were joined by Pandorda and his White Mage character Istar as well as Firebrand (WHM), Kinkkerbelle (BST), Aerdrie (SMN), Fyaninana (WHM), Korjon (THF), Crayola (RDM), Fravan (PLD) and Faule (THF). Neyla was amused by the number of Noble's Tunics in our party and joked they must give them out like candy, to which Fyaninana said "I wish."

Toraimarai

Bonze Mayberry has to die... a lot.

Canal was a cakewalk, and we were able to take out the Hinge Oils and get into the Animastery without incident. We returned to Windurst so everyone could flag the next mission and head to Kazham for the appropriate cutscenes.

I went straight to the Temple of Uggalepih to wait for them. Miriya turned up with some other people and I spoke to him a minute. When I said we were ushering some folks through to Rank 8 he got snippy that he couldn't get help getting Rank 10. I don't know if he thought it was a linkshell activity or what and I didn't care at that point. I told him to try signing up at QCDN, but I don't see that happening.

We got to our temple camp and pulled Bonze Mayberry a few times until we had all the cursed keys we needed. Pandorda is one of those taru black mages with a death wish, and he dropped a few times while we were there. Fravan dropped once to the Everyone's Grudge move, but otherwise it was smooth as silk.

I even managed to get an Uggalepih Coffer Key, which means I'll be able to get the map out of that gods-forsaken place at some point.

Darkness Renamed

The loose "Chains of Promathia" static Quieren organized met today in Jeuno for another run at Diabolos after Thursday's embarrassing loss. I owe Q an apology, as it turns out the lack of Stun wasn't his fault because that skill is above the Lv. 40 cap for the mission.

While

I own a Noble's Tunic! Sweet!

we were waiting, Q asked how much gil I had for the Noble's Tunic. I had a little over 11 million (the bonecrafters seem to have disappeared into the woodwork these days), so he loaned me 2 million. The price on Noble's Tunics had dropped to 14 million at the Auction House, so I tried bidding 13. No such luck.

I was going to wait awhile because, as Q pointed out, we were in a Full Moon phase and every crafter and his brother would soon be churning them out and they'd be undercutting each other like crazy. I didn't have to wait because Nicolette, who is also in The Nameless linkshell, loaned me 1 million. I bid 14 and still couldn't get it, but then I tried bidding 14.1 million and got it!

I'll be fishing hardcore for a little while longer to repay them, but at least now I have a shiny Noble's Tunic of my own. I'm completely ecstatic over this like you wouldn't believe.

Once everyone had gathered, I teleported us out to Xarcabard for the trek to Pso'xja. It didn't take long to get to the Diabolos area. Nico got aggro at one point, but the run to the assorted warps is so short that it didn't matter. Nico already has Sea Access, and her expertise on this fight was great.

It

Diabolos gloats over our dead bodies.

actually took us three tries to win. During the first fight, we opened up with two-hour abilities to try and slaughter Diabolos from the start. It was working, but unfortunately our Paladin (Reko) was standing on the wrong square and was dropped into a group of ravenous Diremite Assaulters. It was a complete wipe. This time I waited until we were outside the BCNM to raise myself.

The second fight went FUBAR from the start, and things went bad so fast I wasn't sure exactly what happened. All I know is Nightmare went off and we started getting screwed pretty hard. Nico used Escape and got some of us out in time, and we had to run back to Pso'xja to get them raised.

The third time was a sweet fight. This time we stood right on top of Nico, who knew the exact spot to avoid Nightmare. We didn't get hit by it this time and I only had to worry about using Erase on Reko and Andreva. I also managed to take off my noob asshat this time and remembered to enfeeble Diabolos; Paralyze and Slow fucked him up hard. We won, and we'll be doing the dragon fight for the next mission on Tuesday.

I spent the rest of my evening fishing for Black Sole, although I did take a detour to join Neyla for another Windy Mission 6-2 BCNM fight. This time we got Duffman and Faule through it. They headed off to Castle Oztroja to farm a Judgment Key while I returned to Jeuno to fish more sole and repay my loan.