Glue Factory

I'd

I made brass sheets in my moghouse.

almost forgotten to check on my chocobo today, which would've been a shame because it's magical Day 19. I couldn't wait to get into the stables and find out what color he'd be. I was disappointed to see he had white-tipped feathers, meaning he'd be a common yellow bird. I immediately retired him -- "I didn't even name the worthless little bastard," I told Neyla later -- and handed in the egg with the green bird.

After that, I did a little crafting in my moghouse by turning brass ingots into brass sheets. I traveled to San d'Oria and took the first smithing exam by handing in a Xiphos. Then I logged out and went to see The Dark Knight for the third time.

Life Underground

I've ignored Vana'diel for the past three days because of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. I haven't played through much of it myself, but I watched Neyla slash his way through it. I logged in for a few minutes each day to feed and care for my chocobo, but that's been all.

I

You load sixteen tons, and what do you get?

was back in full force today, and I decided to do some crafting. In order to make the hobby bo furniture for my moghouse, I need Goldsmithing skill of at least 20. I still had all the copper ingots from my last crafting binge, and I burned through them by making a bunch of copper hairpins. I saved one for the guild exam and sold the rest to an NPC.

The next step involved making brass ingots. The copper ores are only 3 gil each, but I wasn't going to pay for zinc ores. Instead, I grabbed my field gear and a few stacks of pickaxes and went into Zeruhn Mines. I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed mining. There were two or three other people there, which made it easier because the mining points shifted around a lot. Hooray for Sprinter's Shoes, too.

The only bad part was the number of iron ores I extracted. My smithing skill isn't high enough to do anything with them, so I put some up for sale at the Bastok auction house. After that, I was pretty much reduced to throwing them away with the pebbles and snapping moles. I hate being wasteful, but there wasn't anything I could do.

Zinc ores in hand, I hit Port Bastok's airship docks and bought copper ores to make make the brass ingots. I finished with my goldsmithing skill at 8.

I got a nice bonus by digging out two Darksteel Ores. Selling those meant I finished up my crafting experience with a profit.

Poisonous Gas

I

We had to clear out a few gnoles before we fought the orc.

wasn't really expecting to start the San d'Orian quests from the Crystal War today, but Neyla was running around getting cutscenes while I was lounging around the chocobo racetrack. I had to play catch-up. It's not a bad storyline, although it pales in comparison to Windurst's struggles. Neyla bumped into a tarutaru Blue Mage named Malich who was also working the quests, so he extended an invitation to join us.

The kids in the storyline crack me up, since they're you're typical uber-snooty elvaan who take everything way too seriously. I had to run out to Vunkerl Inlet and watched one of them in a fishing competition with a gigas, and it was like some kind of primal battle between titans... sorta. The carbon fishing rod made a decent reward, although of course I unloaded it quickly because it can't touch the Lu Shang.

Dalamar tagged along for the next quest, since it didn't involve a battlefield he couldn't enter. We had to travel to a platform in Jugner Forest [S] and fight an orc named Cobraclaw Buchzvotch. I outposted and had to circle around to meet the others at the telepoint, where we rented chocobos and rode to the platform. The only semi-tricky part was clearing out the Decrepit Gnoles so they wouldn't aggro during the fight. Otherwise, it was extremely easy.

The next quest simply involved clicking a ??? in Jugner. I quickly realized I'd never bothered to mark the zone line from Ronfaure to Jugner, so I had to follow Neyla. I'd forgotten about the big ramp and took a moment to marvel at how cool it looked.

We

The goblins and orcs were weak, but there were plenty of them.

finished up with the quest "In a Haze of Glory," which involved fighting orcs and goblins under Garlaige Citadel. We had a rough moment when we took a wrong turn and Malich ended up getting killed by yagudo, but we got him back on his feet and found the battlefield.

The orcs had been pumping poisonous gas into the place, and the goal was to track down and destroy their turret. The mobs were spread out and could largely be avoided, and the ones we had to fight went down quickly. The hard part is just finding the damned thing, which took us awhile. There were multiple Black Mage orcs around it, and that was the most damage we took during the entire event. Still, we beat them down and destroyed the turret.

We returned to San d'Oria for our final cutscenes and the reward: a Fullmetal Bullet for the ammo slot which gives STR+2 and DEX+2 during Campaign. I wonder how much gil an NPC would give me for it...

Win Some, Lose Some

I

RedGirl pulled ahead of Pacey, but it didn't last.

entered RedGirl in the first race of the Pashhow Swamptrot this morning. I was surprised to learn it would be a race without jockeys -- I didn't know if she'd use a Speed Apple on her own -- and doubly surprised to learn it was a one-on-one race against... a sheep. A sheep named Pacey, of all things. The fluffy little bastard had a move called Sheep Charge that gave it a hell of a speed boost, and it spammed it. RedGirl would pull ahead and then fall behind. I lost, but it was close. I'm thinking I'll have to use a Gysahl Bomb to slow him down next time.

The update brought some new changes to the way territories are won during the Crystal War, and this week Windurst controlled all of its zones. I'd planned to drop some bombs as Dragoon after finishing the chocobo races, but I had nothing to bomb. I was about to log out when Nanunanoo apologized for falling asleep last night. I assured him it was okay.

I came back a few hours later and did some Campaign battles with Neyla and Dalamar. I was amused with a Samurai named Shadoboy taunted Neyla about holding hate and tried to turn it into a pissing contest. It's a goofy taunt, since Neyla doesn't bite at that sort of thing and has no problems letting people die if they can't keep it under control. Dalamar knows Shadoboy and said "Just watch. He'll start shouting for cures in a minute," which of course he did.

While we waited for Nan to log on agaim, we took a break and did the San d'Oria escort for the first time in months. It's always entertaining watching Paladins "fight" mobs when I'm on Monk because the difference in damage output is so extreme; in fairness, I'm sure it's just as entertaining for Neyla to watch me "tank." I popped the scroll on Dragoon, which put me only 200xp away from 64.

When

Neyla, Dalamar and I fight gigas in West Sarutabaruta [S].

Nan came back, we geared up for another run at the "Feast for Gnats" fight. I was still MNK/DNC and Dalamar was still Paladin, but this time Neyla went RDM/WHM and Nan was BLM/WHM. Our plan was to keep the NPCs alive and help them defeat the mobs before turning our attention on the Confederate Belfry.

It went a lot better than our previous attempts. The quadav were far squishier than I expected (except for the hated Nickel Quadav), but keeping them slept was a problem. We lost spectacularly, all of us dying and having to homepoint.

Since we'd started right before the day changed, we were able to return to the fight almost immediately. Neyla changed to RDM/BLM for some Dynamis-style crowd control and the subjob made a huge difference. Nan changed over to White Mage for increased healing power. As the only damage dealer, I ran around punching mobs and trying to get their attention when they'd wake up and run for the mages.

The gigas arrived and Neyla slept them in a nice little cluster. It was almost disappointing, because I only got to throw one or two punches before they warped out. The mithra had started attacking the belfry and demolished in seconds. I love the Windurst storyline.

While I lounged in my moghouse, Neyla gathered up his seals and took them to Shami in Port Jeuno. The final count was 1,058 beastmen and 521 kindred. I knew it would be high, but damn.