Year One Recap #2
Continuing the review of stuff you weren’t there for but I want to remember later…
These are roughly in chronological order, best I can remember.
Salvage Static - October to October
I started Ereblog in the salvage static and I ended year one in the static, though there was a period of time when I quit because of SX and a large number of other times when I strongly considered quitting out of frustration. Salvage is a very love-hate kind of event. Love because it usually is somewhat entertaining and hate because bard is a terrible godawful soul-sucking job, especially when you are asked to do bard on bhaflau rampart farming runs six or seven times in a row.
In the end, I’m glad I stayed in the salvage group, if only because I am probably the single most rewarded member in the entire group. And because they’re paying for half my Morrigan’s robe. But more seriously, Salvage significantly influenced me to keep playing the game since it’s pretty entertaining and generally only had competent players. Shpen did a bang-up job keeping it running. We all poke fun at him at times for missing salvage nights, but when you think about it, keeping a static running for over a year is a truly amazing feat and a few periods of weakness can be overlooked.
Nobles Tunic - Nov 12
The Nobles tunic incident happened at a pretty lousy time for me in the game. I’d just returned from quitting over the summer and was still in a pretty bad money crunch in November, having given away all wordly possessions when I quit. AXI kept telling me they’d give me an LS Nobles tunic but it had been weeks of waiting and broken promises. When I found out they had 8 shining cloths sitting around on a mule and still weren’t willing to give me one to get my own synthed, I about snapped.
At some point around that time, I was working on a pictoral guide for the missions to CoP (a guide that I had to sadly abandon due to lack of webspace bandwidth for the project) and was taking screenshots of myself in CoP cutscenes. I made a remark on allakhazam about not having my own nobles tunic and needing to borrow one from a friend to do the screenshots. Apparently someone read this, created a mule, put a nobles tunic on it, and server transferred it to Sylph just to give it to me.
I still have a screenshot of the conversation I had with this person, but I was asked not to post it publically. I really wish I could. It’s pretty much the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me in the game.
Most Productive Day of FFXI Ever - Nov 14
Completing ToAU missions, beating two high rank assaults, and getting a good piece of artifact armor is apparently all it takes to be declared the most productive day of FFXI ever. I consciously keep this one in mind, trying to beat it somehow. So far, no dice.
Dancer Static - December to January
When I first met Cib, I suggested we do a DNCx2 static since we both had plans to level the job. This was well before the job had actually been released and so I had no idea if DNCx2 would be any good together. Turns out, it was both effective and extremely satisfying. We duoed all over the place, including odd spots like Promyvion (which wasn’t very good exp honestly but made fun screenshots).
This right here is one of my most treasured screenshots. Nothing says “I’ve got your back and you’ve got mine” quite like removing a status effect from your partner before removing your own. Cibele proved to be an excellent and trusthworthy duo partner. It’s a shame that our schedules changed and so we had to disband the static, but we got a solid 39 levels out of it first.
The Wight on Qufim - December
This was a specific fight in the dancer static that was our most noteworthy battle. While duoing at level 21 on Qufim we got aggro from a wight and tried to fight it despite dancer being a poor job fighting undead. We both had to 2hour and covered eachother excellently. In the end, I got killed, and just after I died, Cibele did an attack for 1 damage that killed it.
This fight taught me a couple things. If either of us had one more STR, DEX, VIT, attack, defense, or any stat really, I would have survived the fight. That’s how close it was. But more importantly it showed us how amazingly strong dnc is. We did so well against an opponent we couldn’t use our drains on when entire parties run in fear and die. So, although I did die, it was one of my best little triumphs.
Campaign Rampage - December to January
I cannot stress enough how much campaigning I did during these two months. I took paladin from 73 to 75 and got enough merits to cap out my WHM’s tier I and II categories. The large majority of it was Cibele’s NIN and my PLD during times when there weren’t enough people seeking to form a DNC party, though Wiseman’s RDM showed up on occasion and quickly got the reputation for MPKing us in stupid ways. Serious amounts of campaign. I loved it a lot more back in the old days when things seemed more balanced. There were some seriously epic fights on the slopes of Grauberg. I would continue to do campaigning all through the spring and summer, but mostly alone, so it just wasn’t ever quite as cool.
Dancer Tanking - Feb 17
After I returned from my January break from the game and lost my dnc static I took another crack at the job. One of the first invites I got was to actually tank on DNC in an exp party against IT and VT anticans. This was some of the most strenuous FFXI playing I’ve ever done. I didn’t die though. I was so amused by the experience I wrote a little guide about it on alla. Dancer tanking ultimately went nowhere as far as mainstream goes, but at least I can say I did it.
La Vaule Thwacking - March 30
Shortly after the beastmen strongholds were introduced, Wise, Kisa, Soldon, and myself went there to check things out. The fortifications were up and so we started thwacking away, hoping to do some damage. In doing so, we completely broke campaign! The orcs, thinking their home base was under attack, slowly sent literally every available army there to try to stop us, but since they wouldn’t attack us if we didn’t have tags on they just kind of stood there and stared. For hours after we started, no other area would be attacked. Probably annoyed the crap out of everyone something fiece.
We had a few close calls, like when Soldon invoked the wrath of the mob with a Roar from his pet. We also managed to land amnesia on an Orc NM via a ladybug pet. That had to have been embarrassing.
Avatar Soloing - April - Shiva Titan Ifrit Leviathan Garuda Ramuh
This was just flat-out good times. What started as not finding anyone willing to help me fight Shiva for her claws turned into the first full-scale test of dancer soloing I’d ever seen anyone talk about. I won all six fights first try even with two deaths involved. About half way through, I was so hooked by the avatar concept that I was compelled to give my summoner another try to 75.
Leviathan Campaigning - April and May
I did a lot of campaigning on summoner. The alternative was to spam cure III on parties, and frankly I just wasn’t that interested. I took full exploit of the black mine glitch that removes avatar perpetuation to run around Bastok areas with a free Leviathan and a suit of Leviathan armor. PLD/DNC is my top campaign job but SMN/SCH came really close. With free Leviathan I could actually tank with him using spinning dives for damage and hate and spring water to keep him healthy, all while aspiring mobs from SCH sub. Easily the most fun I’ve had with my summoner. There’s a good chance this still works by the way, so if you have a SMN give it a shot.
Irish Jig - June 18
In Dynamis glacier. You had to have been there.
Nyzul Group Start - June 18
I’d been helping out on a friend’s Nyzul group for a couple weeks off and on in the summer and was thinking about joining their group officially, but when the goliard hat dropped that nobody wanted other than me and they decided not to give it to me anyway, I got annoyed enough to start my group. In retrospect, I want to shake their ungrateful hands. Because where their group has faded into obscurity and they have essentially no chance of getting their discs to 100 and finishing off their loot lists, my group has climbed to 100 almost twice now, gotten lots of people some of the items they wanted the most, and meets regularly every week without exception. We had our bumps along the road, but by now I can honestly say that this is the best Nyzul static I’ve ever seen.
Leading the ALikelyStory Nyzul group taught me a few things about leading events. Mainly, it’s not all that hard really. One of the early decisions I made was to make sure everyone knows how to complete all of the objectives down pat. It drastically minimizes the amount of micromanagement I need to do. These days, I barely need to say anything - everyone is so familiar with things that we just go in and win. The whole experience really gives me renewed scorn for event leaders that can’t control their own groups.
Salvage Drama - July 20
I hadn’t posted this until now, but screw ‘em, it’s interesting drama. This is the “hidden history” on why Rathian left AXI that nobody heard when he posted is sad little farewell. Very strange stuff. This also marks when a lot of the “old group” left the Salvage static - mainly, all the mages, leaving me as the last reliable one. That, plus my nyzul group eating up a lot of tags that I would use for assault points, has made recent salvaging a bit stressful. Though I can’t say I’m sorry to see a lot of them go - they were either wicked stupid, like the all-excuses white mage Rathian here, or too headstrong to follow orders properly.
That about sums it up. Anything sooner than that is still in recent memory and doesn’t feel like much of an event yet. I intentionally omitted a lot of the entries that involve me getting items (except the Nobles tunic one, because that’s special) as the top 10 items I’ve gotten in the past year is going to be another review.