Campaign Promises

I didn't play much today, since I had Mass Effect, Lost Planet and the 9-disc Alien Quadrilogy to keep myself busy, but I eventually popped on to see what Neyla was into.

Campaign,

Punching yagudo is more fun than leaving it to the jug pets.

of course. The boy is completely into the constant fighting; he's already built up an impressive amount of merit points and XP by hitting every battle he can. I joined him for a few of them today -- I really learned to hate fomor mages after tangling with them in North Gustaberg -- and got a better experience than the normal insta-death I've been receiving from the yagudo in West Sarutabaruta.

I still spent a lot of time dead, but I'm starting to convince myself to stay out of the way and rest up until I can jump back into the fight. I also learned that I prefer going Monk for these, since I do more damage punching away at them.

The campaign systems is a lot of fun, and there's plenty of appeal for folks like me who aren't really into merit parties.

Poor, Poor Bastok

Neyla and I jumped back into the storyline by tackling Bastok today. The trip across Grauberg was nerve-wracking because there were supposed to be Chigoes hopping around in there. I hate those little buggers. They're not difficult to kill, but I'd hate for one to attack and give away my position to one of the quadav or hippogriffs.

I'd

Gnoles do not give up their claws easily.

assumed there was a parallel structure going on for the three nations, where Bastok's quest would introduce us to a future hero as a child and end in a fight with an NM. Instead, we had to fight gnoles to get their claws. The gnoles are clearly patterned after Fenrir, and they have a move which intimidated us. The drop rate on the claws is extremely low. We easily killed 60-70 of those things and only got one claw. I have a feeling that will be adjusted in a future update.

We had to stop because I ran out of Fish Oil Broth, so I shelled out 30k for my claw when we hit Jeuno. As annoying as it was to fight and fight and fight, it gave us a chance to really explore the new Snarl move and revel in being able to use Rampage at the start of a fight because all that enmity could then be transferred over to Courier Carrie.

After all that running around, I have to say Bastok got seriously hosed on the deal. It took hours to get everything finished, and their storyline doesn't seem that great. At least the quest rewards gave back most of the gil I'd spent on the claw.

We farmed our Florid Stones as soon as we finished and logged without even traveling to Jeuno to turn them in.

Bored Now

Well,

Yagudo Theomilitary make our lives difficult.

it didn't take long for me to grow bored with Dancer. Part of it is knowing there's a flood of them out there, and I really don't feel like trying to compete. I'm content to let the job grow a layer of dust for now.

After hearing Neyla's stream of praise for the Campaign system, I finally joined a fight for real. It was in Sarutabaruta West [S], which may not have been the best choice because the yags are overpowered and Windurst has been getting its ass handed to it. There's just something cheap about a yagudo doing Sweep and taking out most of the players with a huge damage spike.

I've also started doing the "Campaign Ops," which are smaller quests you can do to help the war effort. I've only done the supply procurement ones, which basically involve harvesting stuff like majoram or saruta cotton and turning it over to an NPC. There are also escorts and other stuff I haven't tried yet.

Happy Feet

I

Dancing for a yagudo in West Sarutabaruta.

really didn't do much today except goof around on Dancer a bit in West Sarutabaruta. Instead of using a dagger and going /WHM for it, I followed some advice I'd read and used hand-to-hand weapons as /MNK. It was better, because I'd hit more often and could drain additional health from my prey.

I died two or three times when I tried straying above the Easy and Decent prey, and once was from not spotting a yagudo hiding behind a tree while I was fighting a Giant Bee.

The only other major thing I did was Besieged, which will probably end up being one of the last I do. I went to Al Zahbi when the Mamool Ja attacked and spent the hour babysitting General Zazarg. He had well over a dozen enemies slamming him for at least thirty minutes, and I very rarely had to cure him. It was kind of boring, really.

Private Dancer

Gods, so much walking around today to reach San d'Oria in the past. Neyla and I wanted to go there and work our way through their missions as well, since we're eager to get as much of the Crystal War's storyline as possible.

We

Neyla and I fight an orc in Jugner Forest.

didn't get there right away, since Neyla jumped into some Campaign battles in Batallia Downs. I wasn't keen on the distraction, but I finally joined him and died, then homepointed. I ran back to the Jugner zone line and waited for him to finish up. He died, and the mages who'd been fighting alongside him had already taken off. I was about to track down his corpse when a Pixie flew over and gave him Raise III. That's just too handy for words.

The San d'Orian storyline is decent, but I cant help feeling they're getting a bad setup. It seems clear from the Campaign map that beastmen will eventually be able to invade the cities, and the poor elvaan would be fighting in the same zone as Dynamis-San d'Oria. Kinda lame, if you ask me.

I released the Orc from the cage, believing he had to be an elvaan in disguise because nobody but and elvaan could be that long-winded. Neyla and I followed the elvaan kids to the ambush in Jugner Forest to get our revenge at being duped. It was an easy fight, and we followed up by killing the ladybugs to farm wings for a quest.

Neyla escorted me on Black Mage to the necropolis to unlock Scholar. My BLM is only 50xp into 38, and I can't even cast Sneak. It turns out I wasn't in much danger for the trip, and I probably could've done it with one Prism Powder to get past some goblins. I don't know if Scholar will get any use, but at least I have it. Now the only job I don't have unlocked is Corsair.

I

Neyla mocks me as I strut my dance moves.

couldn't really think of anything better to do with my time, so I decided to fool around with Dancer. Everyone and their brother is leveling Dancer to the point where it's impossible to imagine a six-Dancer party forming a chorus line and fan-kicking mobs to death, but I wanted to see what the hype was about.

From what I've read, Dancer is a good healer and tank for smaller parties. It could be handy when Neyla gets around to leveling his Warrior from 20 to 37; if nothing else, we could duo it.

I hit West Sarutabaruta in my fishing gear since it had better defense than the brass stuff you can buy from NPCs. The first five levels were straightforward melee with a dagger, but learning Drain Samba changed everything. I'd do my little dance, and suddenly every hit I landed was draining health from the monster and transferring it to me. Neyla wandered out and laughed and how low on the manly scale i looked while doing it, but I didn't care. I was chewing through Easy and Decent monsters without having to stop.

I could seriously get into Dancer.

You're In the Army Now

Neyla

I'm shaking my moneymaker for San d'Orians.

and I stayed busy today, that's for sure. We're jumping into the expansion and enjoying every minute of it. He's fully embraced the Campaign battles and spent a decent chunk of his day in West Sarutabarta, fighting off attacks by the Yagudo. The first thing I did today was unlock the Dancer job, which saw me traveling to San d'Oria to "dance" on stage and show off my moves.

Our main goal for the day was questing the new maps of Fort Karugo-Narugo, Vunkerl Inlet, and Grauberg. The fort was the hardest for me because I messed up twice and ended up running from the Crawler's Nest to the NPC in Rolanberry a few times. Neyla and I teamed up at that point for the other two, which were much easier.

I returned to Windurst to start the introductory quests and join the allied campaign. The first one involved running to the three towers in West Sarutabaruta to repair cracks on the doors. I had to run back out there and retreive a piece of fruit from Starfall Hillock. Neyla did one of the fights while I was running errands, going nuts over the arrival of cardians to the battle.

The

Young Ajido is on the edge of becoming a yagudo snack.

final part of the quest line involved traveling to Fort Karugo-Narugo to save young Ajido-Marujido from an attack by a War Lynx. We popped our jug pets early since we weren't sure what we were getting into and didn't know if we'd need to have our Call Pet timers ready to go again. This kitty turned out to be much more brittle than its family in Meriphataud Mountains, although it used a move like Throat Stab and dropped my crab to 1% of its health. We got our cutscenes -- the mithras are total badass -- and met up with Cat Sith at the Rolanberry maw.

Before I logged, I returned to the present and switched contracts to the Fisherman's Guild again. I want one of those nifty signs to hang in my moghouse.

"The trolls are at Lv. 2 for Besieged," I told Neyla.

"Fuck trolls," he said. "We're at war with yags, bitch!"

"No," I corrected him, "we were at war with the yagudo. We won. You're living in the past, man!"

We

The cardians join Neyla in the defense of Windurst.

wouldn't have it any other way. I'm seriously enjoying Wings of the Goddess, and so far it's exactly what I wanted in terms of storytelling and execution. There's also something darkly amusing about a couple of atheists like us spending so much energy fighting off a bunch of religious zealots like the Yagudo Theomilitary.

In other news, Veresko broke a newer member's pearl, kicking Kariri out of the linkshell. They were partying together, and Kariri announced in the linkshell that he had to leave because he had a date. Veresko pressed repeatedly to find out if the guy had notified the party leader; Kariri never answered, and then compounded it by dinging his level and warping out on the party. That's a dick move.

Forward Into the Past!

I didn't play Saturday since Neyla and I were hanging out, but I tried registering this morning around 2 a.m. when he left. It only took a few tries this time to call up the right screen and input the codes. I was too tired to log into the game, though.

When

The Cavernous Maw pulls me into the past.

I woke up this morning, I popped in and flagged the Necropolis escort before riding to Jeuno. So many people had been taking chocobos to the maw in Batallia Downs that rentals were over 1k. I walked. The maw is seriously creepy, and it dropped me in Rolanberry Fields.

I ran straight for the past Crawler's Nest. I'm really not sure why they're calling it back then, since the place isn't infested with crawler's and actually looks nice. I was all over the place in there, talking to NPCs and finally heading into the back coffer area. I fought one of the Decent bombs, and it took three Easy saplings to bring it down; clearly, enemies in the past are a lot tougher.

Getting to Windurst through the new fort was an adventure. I'd missed the map NPC, so I had to navigate by Widescan to see the shape of the passageways by mob placement. It took awhile to reach West Sarutabaruta [S], but I grabbed the maw there so I could pass from one timeframe to the next.

There's a bunch of Too Weak toads hopping around one of my old fishing spots, and I pulled out my axe to chop it in half. I got a little surprise when it didn't die in one or two hits. It started beating the crap out of me, which of course pulled its little friends into the mix. I popped a Carrie jug and turned her loose while I put up Stoneskin and got it under control.

Neyla

Neyla and I fight a yagudo with help from a War Lynx duo.

logged on, but I was in desperate need of a nap. We teamed up when I logged on again and he led me to the maws in Batallia Downs, Garlaige Citadel (I don't plan to use that one very often) and Meriphataud. That latter zone was fun because we charmed some War Lynx and turned them loose on a yagudo before returning to the present for the escort and ENM.

We almost lost the ENM due to lack of damage. Cmdrfly couldn't make it, so I went White Mage. Neyla was Paladin and Wulfgar was a healing Black Mage, so that meant our Ninja and Warrior were the only ones hacking away at it with any degree of success. I reminded Wulfgar that he could nuke it, which he interpreted as "Use Manafont." Hadafal and Wulfgar died and the rest of us used our 2-hours to get it under control. It was a close fight.