Oboro Returns

Playing

Soloing is hard work.

Gears of War and Gun has been taking up my attention the last few days, but I eventually popped back into Vana'diel. It's been one of those slack weeks where I haven't been in much of an adventuring mood.

Neyla wasn't on, so I dusted off my spear and decided to level Dragoon. The job has been stalled at 20 for ages, so I'd figured I do a little soloing on the Maze Makers in Shakrami, which range anywhere from Decent to Tough right now. I killed several, but the problem ist I have to be down to a third of my health (roughly 80 HP) to trigger Oboro's Healing Breath move. I think my soloing career is going to need a slightly bigger buffer before I begin.

I returned to Windurst, changed subjobs, and flew out to Jeuno to seek. I was midway through my second stack of sole when I got an invite. I almost wish I'd stayed in Shakrami. The leader, a Blue Mage, acted as puller because the Samurai didn't have a ranged weapon. A puller who has to rest between every other fight is dooming the party's xp from the start.

The party managed to hit two of my bigger pet peeves. The first came when our puller came back with a pugil and our Paladin died. The first thing I'd done when I arrived at the entrance to Delkfutt's Tower was talk to the NPC to set my homepoint there, but I was the only one. We had to stand around for ten or fifteen minutes while the leader shouted for a raise.

The

Oboro readies a breath attack.

second pet peeve came a few minutes after the tank's weakness wore and the Red Mage announced she had to leave to eat dinner. All I could think was Why the hell did you take a party invite if you knew you could only stick around for an hour?. The party leader, it turns out, statics with the Red Mage and also had to leave. The party disbanded with the leader saying he'd try to round us all up again in another two hours. No thanks.

The worst part of it was I was only 12xp away from dinging 21 and they wouldn't stay for one crab. I returned to Windurst, outposted to Buburimu, and killed a bunny to get it. I switched over to Beastmaster, farmed my Florid Stone for Sunday's "Test Your Mite," and then hit Al Zhabi to defend against a troll attack.

I managed to get two .1 skillups while fishing in Port Jeuno, bringing me to 92.4.

Steam Bath

Neyla

Heavy rain in a volcano... fun.

and I went to Ifrit's Cauldron to level our NPCs today. Gauldeval is halfway to maxing out at 65, so another session or two will finish him up and Yawawa can't be close behind. The place was very busy today for some reason; another Beastmaster was there killing bombs when we arrived, so we went out into the open to kill the wyverns. Two other Beastmasters entered the zone and eventually left, but none came near our camp.

We had double-rain weather the entire time. Being in a blazing volcano with rain falling around you is odd; it's a shame they didn't have huge clouds of steam covering the zone to add to the effect.

I went fishing in Port Jeuno a little while. For some reason, the price of Black Sole has been steadily increasing for the last week or two. I think the latest round of bannings must've taken out a few fishbots. I'm not a huge fan of sole as a moneymaker, but I don't mind it right now since they give skillups.

I logged out after two stacks to play Gears of War.

Quieren's Wish

I'm not sure if we were supposed to fight the Yovra on the way to Limbus or if someone got aggro, but we had a rough time. There were too many melees feeding it TP and it kept spamming its abilities. It charmed everyone right after I'd cast Curaga II, so the horde descended on me and beat me to a pulp.

Thankfully,

The bigger they are, the harder it is to stab them in the groin.

Quieren didn't get the killshot on me. The yovra finished me off, and thus spared me from listening to him crow about it for weeks.

"You're supposed to run," he told me. "It could save your life, y'know?"

"I'm not going to run from the likes of you," I laughed.

We did one of Q's favorite zones today, the one with beastmen on every floor. Goblins, sahagins, gigas, anticans... they were all there. I Carby-pulled the gigas floor with no problems, but the final floor with the goblin cluster was a big headache. I've pulled them before without incident, but this time they were ready and waiting for me. They linked, swarmed in, and killed me before the mages could react and sleep them.

Ouch.

I'm not going to complain. We got a few armor upgrade items and I received three Ancient Beastcoins. I now have 14 of 75 coins to buy a Loquacious Earring.

In other news, my latest chocobo hatched today. I named him BlackComet, since he has pureblood parents and shouldn't have anything other than black feathers when he matures.

Jahar

I didn't really have anything planned for today, so I was kinda relieved when I logged on and Jahar asked for help with some Prime Avatar fights. She's been leveling Summoner (a lot of that going around lately) and reached Lv. 20 with only Carbuncle on the roster.

First

Shiva wants to do some 'shrooms.

on the agenda was taking care of the ghost NM for Neyla's Bard armor. While Jahar checked her fame levels to get access to the avatar battles, Neyla, Apu and I went to the altar in Monastic Cavern. We had to clear out the Orcish Warlord first, but it wasn't much of a problem. Neyla popped Bugaboo and we killed it fast.

The fight against Shiva was easy. Apu came as Warrior to tank it and I stayed on Beastmaster. I decided to use a funguar jug pet to test its damage output with the gloves and Beast Affinity merit, and it did okay, knocking out around the same damage I was doing instead of the bigger numbers Carrie manages. I look forward to trying it again after it's maxed out.

Jahar still has some fame issues to work out for the other avatars, but we'll kill them for her as she gains access.

I had nothing else to do, so I rode out to Jeuno to do some fishing. The price of Black Sole has risen steadily over the past few days, although I'm sure it'll drop again as more anglers notice it. I can't complain because I got a .1 fishing skillup, bringing me to 92.2.

The Crimson Dominatrix

BigKahunas

Some stiletto heels would complete the dominatrix look for Neyla.

went for a rematch against Carbuncle today and rocked that zone hard. We only had to fight Titan before the final bout, and we cleared it with plenty of time. Quieren brought the bank and everyone received three Ancient Beastcoins. The only AF item was a Smalt Leather for upgrading Beastmaster armor, which I lotted to hold in reserve.

We stopped to fight a Yovra on the way to the zone. Q had offered a bounty to anyone who got charmed and killed me, but my death came from running forward to use Devotion and getting squashed by that drilling move they use. Ha!

Neyla and I started questing his Bard armor as soon as Limbus ended. I've seen him wearing the Gaudy Harness as Beastmaster plenty of times ever since we first quested it, but it looks different when he's on Bard with the mithra RSE in the other slots. "You look like the Crimson Dominatrix," I laughed.

We had an easy time. The first trip was to the back entrance of Eldieme Necropolis via Beaucedine Glacier. It's the same room where we fought for my Beast Leggings the other day. I'd read on a forum post that you could Sneak pop the skeletons and fight them individually, but that turned out to be false. They started pounding on Neyla right away, but we turned our CourierCarries loose and got it under control.

Our next stop was the Crawler's Nest coffer. I scouted ahead and found it in the Rumble Crawler room, but another player questing AF got there before Neyla. We had to wait for it to respawn. From there we hit Castle Oztroja and found the coffer on the stairs just before the top floor with Flagellants and Prelates. I used a crab to distract a Yagudo Abbot so Neyla could pop it.

We

Dark Spark never stood a chance, the poor thing...

had enough time before "Test Your Mite" to kill Dark Spark. First we had to travel to Castle Zvhal to find the coffer, swing back to Jeuno for the next part of the quest, and then return to Castle Zvahl for the actual fight. Neyla expressed pity for the poor bomb, who died faster than the ones in Ifrit's Cauldron. He died so fast I joked he could've been a villain in the Ghost Rider movie.

"Test Your Mite" went well. We decided to change the rules for the Geist Earring drops; instead of splitting the gil, it's a straight lot and the winner gets to keep it or sell it. We'll continue to split Woodsman Rings. We got both today. With the ENM and the scroll from the Necropolis escort, I'm halfway to 59 on Monk.

Neyla started the first part of the Bard body quest. We have to finish it tomorrow.