Gaudy Harnesses

"Adventuring with Neyla today will be perilous. You must rely on each other's strengths to overcome the difficulties you will face today. Don't let petty squabbles bring your downfall." - Pherchabalet, Port Windurst

The Gaudy Harness is a beautiful piece of gear for Beastmasters because, in addition to the CHR bonus, the latent effect gives you Auto-Refresh until you get to 49 MP. It doesn't sound like a lot, but a BST can do plenty with that small amount.

I'd asked the linkshell if they wanted to go subligar hunting in the aqueducts, but to my considerable horror my parents' computer had a meltdown and I wasn't able to go. Neyla went, and they got his subligar and also one for Otak so her Bard could get a harness.

Beastmasters can solo their subligar, so as soon as I was able to log on again I started gearing up. I bought some Flint Caviar for the CHR (30k a stack in Jeuno, 15k a stack in Windurst) and went in. I waited for the three taurus mobs to turn away so I could sprint across the room to the ladder, worked my way through the waterways and dropped down in a room with three stegotaurs.

"What are you doing in there?" Neyla asked when he popped on.

"Take a guess," I said.

"I'm heading your way," he told me.

The

The Oil Spill and I shred the Fomor Beastmaster like tissue paper.

tunnel off to the left had an Oil Spill which rated Incredibly Tough. That was my target. I moved out of range and started trying to charm him. The first attempt failed and pissed it off, but I stayed in the water while it chased me until it lost aggro and despawned. I tried charming it again and this time I nailed it. I immediately used my two-hour.

I wasn't completely sure which way I was supposed to go at that point -- the guide wasn't crystal clear on that -- but soon realized I had to get through the room with the stegotaurs on the bridges. Once they were turned away, I shot past them and through the tunnel into the room with the fomors. They don't link, although the two Hell Bats flapping around will link with the Beastmaster's pet. There was enough room for me to pull him without problems into the hall with the diremite.

The Oil Spill chewed the fomor like he was made of tissue paper, and it took very little damage in the process. It didn't drop the subligar, so I had to wait 14 minutes for another pop. By that time Neyla was in the aqueducts, but I didn't have a map and couldn't guide him to my position.

The Beastmaster spawns without a pet, so if you grab him quick you don't have to worry about links. I pulled him, but my two-hour wore off when he was down to 30% and I lost charm on the Oil Spill. I died.

Neyla and I went out into Lufaise Meadows to slaughter beastmen and kill time until my two-hour was back. Again, no problems with taurus aggro. I charmed the Oil Spill on the first try, used Familiar on it, and hustled to the fomor room. I killed the Beastmaster and the subsequent pop without a drop.

Neyla hadn't used Familiar, so we went back across the Stegotaur so he could charm an Oil Spill. He missed the first attempt but got the second. We went back and waited for the fomor to pop. It was the fifth fight of the night, and it dropped my subligar!

"Once again the mithra saves the day," Neyla joked.

Apu,

Neyla and I show off our lovely Gaudy Harnesses.

Neyla and I wanted to do the Necropolis escort quest, but first I went to Bastok for the Gaudy Harness quest. Brygid wanted me to wear a Bishop's Robe and a pair of hose. Neyla flew to Jeuno and bought them for me. I got my harness, but I didn't get to try it on until after the escort quest was complete and I was ready to eat the scroll we'd won.

I can't wait to try it out. It's going to kill our downtime when we xp on BST.

"I feel like a real BST wearing this," Neyla commented as we were heading for the airship to Jeuno.

"Same here," I agreed. "Doubly so considering how we got it."

"Even more so because we got it that way," he said at the same time.

"Get out of my head!" I laughed. That was the second or third time we'd finished each other's sentences in a week, which Neyla said was "a duo thing."

I was amused to learn Neyla had worked out a little backstory. Neyla was orphaned in the war and raised by tarutarus (hence the devotion to the little folk) and we're like siblings.

Breaking the Wave

Our

Mouu the Waverider and his wyvern are annoyances.

xp session in the Sea Serpent Grotto was interrupted by the appearance of Mouu the Waverider, a sahagin NM who drops the Monsoon Lance. There was nothing Neyla and I could do except run back to Norg and switch over to Red Mage and White Mage to take him out. He linked with one of the bards and called a wyvern shortly into the fight, but it was nothing we couldn't handle. He didn't drop the lance, either; we got a Bastore Sardine for our trouble.

We'd set our homepoints in Norg, so we warped back and switched back Beastmaster and returned to our xp camp.

And what a camp! It's just on the other side of the Mythril Door, in a small alcove with two leeches right there and several more flopping around the larger room. None of the sahagins roam near the place, and they're so spread out that links are practically nonexistant. The level range had a few decents in the mix, but mostly they were Evens and Toughs. A good number of the crabs were Very Toughs and were wonderful for closing a chain.

I love using leeches as pets. They don't take a lot of damage, so we didn't have to use very much pet food the entire time we were there.

We

Yay! We can wear our big buckskin oven mitts.

worked fast and earned xp a lot faster than we did in the Quicksand Caves. There wasn't nearly as much running around. Neyla was listening to The Living End at his place, and I had three of his Living End CDs on my iPod, so we ended up listening to the same CDs and discussing the music as we sprinted toward Lv. 54 and our Beast Gloves. They look like buckskin oven mitts, but they contrast well with the Gaia Doublets. I retired my Battle Gloves, which I've worn faithfully on my BST since I hit Lv. 12 and could equip them.

I'll be at my parents' house for the next week, so my gaming time will be sporadic. I'm hoping to squeeze in a BST session or two if there's time. The xp in the grotto slowed down after we hit 54, but it would be relatively stress-free if we only have a couple hours to goof around. We'll see how it goes.

I'm stealing the computer on Saturday morning to farm BST subligars with the linkshell, though. I want my Gaudy Harness. I'm comforted by the knowledge that I can solo it if I want, but there's considerable safety (and fun) in numbers. I'm hoping we have a few WHMs along for the ride so I can go as BST, but I'll do what needs to be done.

Antican Antics

Neyla

The anticans aren't so scary anymore.

and I hit the Quicksand Caves today. I'd scoped out the area, and it seemed pretty viable. There were plenty of Sand Siders and Helm Beetles trundling around, and none of them aggro. The only aggro mobs we had to worry about were the Aniticans Signifer, Hastatus and Princeps which lurk near the dropoff to the cloister, and it's very easy to give them a wide berth until you're ready to sic a pet on them.

More of the pets conned Tough than I would've liked, and at one point we seemed destined to leave altogether when Neyla took a non-fatal Sickle Slash to the head. We didn't give up, though; we went back in and established a nice groove on our way to Lv. 53.

The only rough spot of the evening was the Lv. 73 Thief who came in with his NPC and started killing everything in sight. I'm always polite to these people -- sometimes they just don't realize you're around -- but he was starting to wear away my patience. I pointed out that he was destroying our xp camp, and he started copping an attitude with me -- "Where else am I supposed to level my NPC that's under Windurst control?"

My favorite response when I pointed out that he wouldn't be rude and do the same thing near a six-member xp party was "You have a trillion places to level," which means he might as well wear a hat saying "I've never leveled BST."

I finally convinced him to drop down into the path to the cloister and leave our area. Once he was gone, we waited for repops and started up again.

"You're

Would you want to take a Sickle Slash to the face?

a stubborn taru," Neyla pointed out.

"I'm not wasting thirty minutes going from here to the Crawler's Nest when I can convince this asshat to move on," I said.

We'll check out the Sea Serpent Grotto tomorrow. The Quicksand Caves were kinda nice, but a little slower than I'd probably like. I don't care what it takes, though; I just want to wear my gloves.

Speaking of gear, Hadafal made signed Crow Berets and sent them to me and Neyla. We'll wear them proudly. I think I set a speed record in putting my unsigned one up for sale.

OMG OMG OMG OMG

Truegrave wasn't online when our CoP time rolled around, and he hadn't said anything to Quieren about being absent. Q had originally said he'd scrub any run if someone caused us to be late, but instead he brought in Cythe to tank the Snoll Tzar for us.

We had plenty of cores, so we headed out to Uleguerand Range to begin our next run at death. Cythe went PLD/DRK for heavier damage output and warned me to be ready with the cures when he used Souleater.

"I'll blow my load on the snolls face," Cythe said. "It'll act like HQ salt."

"That's a fun visual," I laughed.

"I'm going to start calling my load 'snoll,'" Asmodius joked.

"I should've done my static with you guys," Cythe said. "My group was dry and boring."

"You need a sense of humor when you die as much as we have," I explained.

Cythe survived Heimdel Storm, that hideous move that one-shotted Truegrave, but he didn't survive the aftermath because I was using my salt on the snoll. Wipeout.

We

Halifirien and Quieren celebrate victory.

went back to Lufaise to farm a few more cores and to wait for our two-hour timers to reset. For the second run, Cythe had me use the salt first so I could keep the cures going. We went in and unleashed on that bomb. He knocked me into the red with one of his AoE moves, and his Frost finished me off. He went straight for Hayatox and then Asmodius. I was gritting my teeth for another wipeout when I realized we'd won! We'd managed to kill the fucking thing after an uncountable number of deaths.

Cythe was out of MP and couldn't cure himself, so the frost killed him outside the arena while I was watching the cutscene. We were all freaking out over the victory.

"I'm shaking, I swear," Quieren said.

"I just blew my snoll all over the keyboard," I joked.

Nobody minded the deaths, we were so happy to be finished with it.

"Grats on the win," Cythe told us. "The good news is you have the hardest BCNM of CoP out of the way. The bad news is you have the airship battle next."

We

Halifirien strengthens his bond with his NPC boytoy.

disbanded, so I started gathering up all the food items needed for the "Past Reflections" quest for my NPC. All but one of the items are available from NPCs, so I ran around Jeuno to buy some of them. White Bread can be bought from a merchant inside the Marble Bridge Tavern, which I'd never been in because I never had the right job. They were welcoming Beastmasters, so I switched jobs and went in.

It was too late for me to considering taking Gauldeval out and leveling him, so I logged when I got back to Windurst.

Quieren and Asmodius won't be online Thursday, so I don't have CoP until next week. That gives us Wednesday and Thursday to level Beastmaster; with luck, we'll hit 54 and be wearing our Beast Gloves before I go on vacation.

Evil Weapons

Back in the dark ages, I was in a party which leveled on the beetles in Sauramugue Champaign, but I'd never tried fighting the Evil Weapons. Apu suggested it as a camp for our subjob leveling, so I started looking for three people to round out our subjob static. I found a Samurai, Black Mage (complete with his own powerleveler via a sibling's character) and Thief.

The

Evil Weapons aren't fond of Ifrit's Burning Strike move.

weapons were surprisingly easy to kill, and their Whirl of Rage attack didn't do nearly as much damage to the group when Neyla quietly suggested I use Garuda to give everyone Aerial Armor to negate it. We moved along pretty fast, although the PL eventually left and we continued on just fine. The xp started slowing down, so we decided to go into the Citadel when Apu hit 33.

That turned out to be a mistake. Our level range and party setup made it very hard to kill anything, and the Thief disconnected. There was a taru Dragoon there, so we pulled him in as a replacement. After one or two fights with horrific downtime, Neyla flipped out and was threatening to come back as Red Mage to PL us, which made me laugh because I would've disbanded us. Instead, I moved us back out to the weapon camp. The xp numbers were low, but the kills were a lot faster than the bats and beetles.

The DRG wanted to leave to watch wrestling, but stayed long enough for him, me and Apu to get our levels. Neyla was only 1k out from 33, but he wasn't about to grind out the last bit. He and I switched to our mains and leveled our NPCs in Zitah so he could kill stuff and get it out of his system.

Not a bad evening, really. The xp ground to a crawl at the end, but I still got two levels in one evening. I consider that a win. With any luck we'll only need 2-3 more sessions to escape subjob hell. The three of us will do the Necropolis escort quest tomorrow for more xp. Lv. 37 can't come soon enough.

Neyla Guest Entry: Quoted for Truth

I saw this quote in a signature at Allakhazam and thought it was an excellent summary of the Beastmaster job.

Saboruto wrote:
I don't NEED your invites. What it takes six of you to do I can accomplish all by myself. And, while I may not need YOUR help, I'm always happy to lend a hand if you need ME. I go places nobody else dares go, I see things you couldn't imagine. Fear has no place in my heart, only peace and solitude. I am a beastmaster.

More posting after some RL home renovations are complete and when the BST leveling sessions are eating less time.

Paragons of Beastmaster Excellence

Neyla

The ghostly Beastmaster and his opo-opo give us our final piece of AF.

and I spent Saturday evening in Beastmaster hell, trying to find a good camp because we're in that transition range where no spot is really spectacular for xp. We also bumped into one of my pet peeves: the anonymous Beastmaster. It sucks when you go into the Crawler's Nest expecting to fight stuff and then get to camp to find BSTs who didn't turn up on your search. Inconsiderate pricks; there's a reason I put our camp location in my search comment.

We crutched along and got to Lv. 51, though. When it was over we switched to Red Mage and White Mage so Veresko (Ranger) and Otak (Black Mage) could go back to the Necropolis to help us get our final piece of AF. The fight was much easier, and we were treated to a nice cutscene with the ghostly Beastmaster being reunited with the opo-opo from Castle Oztroja. We also received the title "Paragon of Beastmaster Excellence."

This morning I went out to Lufaise Meadows to scope out the treant camp as a possible leveling spot. Most of the saplings conned Even, so I charmed one and sent it in to attack. The charm wore off after about a minute, and it started smacking me and linked with another sapling that had fluttered nearby. I died, but Hoiy was in the area and gave me a Raise III. I joined Veresko, Hoiy, Zoner, Otak and Malystrixx in Riverne B to camp Boroka, but he was already dead when we got there.

I hit the ferry to catch Titanictus for a bonecrafter who agreed to pay 10k each (twice the going rate, but otherwise they're not worth my time to catch). I didn't get very many, but there were two pirate attacks in a row and I caught six Sea Zombies and dinged 85 fishing skill. That fat galka bastard Zaldon even found a Drill Calamary in one of the zombies, which means I know have my first piece of bait for the long quest toward the Ebisu Rod.

Apu

The Crawler's Nest isn't too bad for xp.

had to cancel our subjob leveling, so Neyla and I decided to level Beastmaster again. The treant camp was too much trouble -- the saplings were conning Tough and it was too much hassle to convert them -- and we headed back to the Crawler's Nest and camped in the donut cave hallway leading to the exoray room. We charmed Hornflies and Exorays and fought Blazer Beetles. It'll never go down as one of my favorite camps, but we did surprisingly well for ourselves. A couple of NPC levelers turned up at one point, but after a polite word they agreed to kill stuff on the other side of the room away from our camp.

We dinged 52 and were able to wear our nifty Beast Gaiters. Neyla bought a Gaia Doublet, which I might also buy if another turns up at the Auction House.