Toro Toro Toro
Hello again everyone. Sorry for the absence for the last few days, their's been a lot of stuff done and not much time to write about them all. So without further adieu, let's get started shall we? =)
First off, you may notice the new shiny blue linkshell beside my name. After a few weeks of hanging out with the folks of The Mystical Order (TMO) and learning the ropes of the HNM scene, I was finally accepted into the linkshell. TMO is known for being one of the best HNM shells on the server, favoring the quality of it's members over sheer numbers. I can only hope, despite my... well, flaws, that I can do this group proud. With the new linkshell, I have made a few changes to my high-level activities, mainly to keep the stress to a managable level. I have (with some reluctance I might add) left the friendly confines of CuteCuteSky. I know they've got a great group there, and I know they're more than capible of doing great things, and I wish them all the luck in the world. Also, I have left Fantasy Forever (FF) in favor of TMO's dynamis group. This, unlike CCS, I don't regret in the least... their lot policy just sucked badly, and being buried 8-9 deep in black mages means I would likely never see any AF2 in the near future. Aslo, several comments made by FF memebers (who also runs InfinitumNihil, a rival HNM group), really caused me to lose a lot of respect for their leadership.
FYI: No, I am still throughly a Roundabout... someone's gotta be there to throw the monkey wrench into Milk and company's shinanagans. =)
Now, onto the update... ^_~
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Gration (Mr. WTF is his intimidate skill?! +100?!)
My first official HNM fight with TMO (that business with Vrtra... that doesn't count)... and what a dandy this guy turned out to be. Gration is one of the newer generation HNM's triggered by trading an item (in this case, a Hickory Shield) to a ??? point in Miseraux Coast near Tavnazian Safehold. Though not as terribly powerful as some of the other HNM's like Nidhogg or King Behemoth, Gration's not without his own suprises. He packs a massive AoE stomp attack that was taking people from full HP to zero in a heartbeat, and his most powerful tool, the ability to intimidate others, similar to the beastmaster ability, but far more effective. It's bad enough when your trying to get the right range for a NM that's being kited on a string, but after figuring his intimidation ability in, I got maybe 1 spell in 10 attempts off on him.... quite annoying if you ask me.
Thankfully, his intimidation isn't 100%, and it wasn't enough for us to eventually whittle it down to death... and with death, this precious little beauty...
An outstanding shield, especially for paladins and beastmasters. I can't wait to see this baby in action against a wide variety of mobs.
We made 2 more runs at Gration that evening, however, we quickly figured out that the shield drop was nowhere near 100% as the bastard refused to drop the shield for us once again. Eventually though, I have no doubt that our persistance will pay off... Also, during our 2nd fight with Gration, we got a little unwelcome addition with Mr. Intimidator...
We don't exactly know for certain if we had struck first, or if Toro linked with the bugard adds we were getting, but let's just say the 2nd fight got annoying very quickly. Toro (the newly added NM for the Blitz Buffalo event) is harmless in terms of damage (all his strikes deal 0 damage). What's annoying about him is that his attacks have amazing kickback, and when we mean kickback, we mean "send you to a randomly selected town" kickback (added effect: random warp...) Fun if your hunting him for the prize he drops... not fun if your fighting a HNM and he comes rolling along. --;
After finishing our Gration runs, we paid a visit to Newton Movapolis where another trigger NM, Bugbear Matman awaited us. I'm not sure exactly what this guy drops as I was only able to stay for 1 pop (which dropped nothing). Very easy fight for an alliance, and a single party also managed to defeat it, despite a near wipe early in the fight.
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Riverne Site #A01:
For months, I had been holding back on attempting this mission again, having gone 0/4 with several other parties that have attempted this mission. Now that I'm with TMO, and their need for those that have not gotten Al'taieu access to get their ASAP, it was due time to try again. Thanks to one of our fellow LS members, I managed to hook up with a band heading out to the area.
Our setup, and the brave souls who dare tread upon these forsaken grounds:
Myself: BLM/WHM
Soulforge: BLM/WHM
Pinchy: WHM/SMN
Thestranger: WAR/NIN
Indeed: WAR/NIN
Noreaga: RNG/NIN
Our plan was fairly simple. Since the mammets are susceptable to bind, Noreaga and myself would keep the right Mammet bound, while indeed kept the 2nd mammet kited away from us. Our first run was mainly a dry run (no items or 2hr's used). We managed to kill the center mammet and take the left one down to bout half health before we nearly wiped. For the most part the plan would work, though having to kite the right mammet around while #1 was still up wasn't exactly how things were supposed to go (for a black mage, I did a pretty good job kiting) =)
Attempt #2: Same setup as before, this time I would bind the mammet while Noreaga kited the right and Indeed the left. Pretty much same thing happened, only this time, we were much more prepared. After the wipe, we reraised up, and with Mammet #1 already downed, the fight afterwards became 100x easier for us. In short order, we downed #2, and then... at last, #3. After 5 previous tries... my 6th attempt at this mission was finally successful. With that, a chilling cutscene and a warp to the shores of South Gustaburg put me on the road into the 3rd chapter of Chains of Promathia.
Prishe = <3. I swear, I break down laughing at times at just how non-elvaan she acts. We need to get her hooked up with a certain Tarutaru rebel who's currently inprisoned.
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After a long celebrated victory, it was time to move on to other things. Outside of the solo ENM60, I hadn't really made any attempts at the other ENM fights out there. Thanks to fellow TMO & Roundabout member Milikai, that would soon change. I got invited to the ENM75 located at Boneyard Gully, deep in the heart of Attowah Chasm. To get to the gully though, you need a Miasma Filter... and getting it would require a trek up the mountain of Parradamo Tor. The tor is a navigator's worst nightmare, as you must circumnavigate up a series of extremly narrow paths, one slip from which can send you quickly back to the bottom. After a bit of roaming about the ledges, we eventually made our way to the top and the cradle of rebirth, where the items we needed was located...
After comming down the moutain and turning the items in to the NPC at the entrance to the Chasm, we were ready to go to Boneyard Gully. The trip there is simple as long as you take care to sneak yourselves, don't want nasty antlions or undead, or the occasional Tiamat to get you (no Tiamat wasn't up this time around). Once at the gully, it was time to face off against a powerful antlion, one they call "A sheep in antlion's clothing"...
Despite a tight time limit and numerous fakes to sort through, we cut through our prey with no problems, and for which... we were doublly rewarded.
Yes, those Forager's Mantles run about 2.5 MILLION gil each, divided amongst 6 people... not a bad days work I would say. I need to do these ENM's more often. =)
With our success in the gully, I decided to tackle a small section of the chapter 3 storyline. During mission 3-3 there are two distinct sections, one staged in the Kingdom of San d'Oria, the other in home sweet Windurst. After hooking up with Milikai and Roelon, we set out upon the Sandy portion of this mission. The majority of which is running about town and getting various cutscenes, which eventually lead you to an NPC in Carpenter's Landing. Course, the NPC we were sent to speak with turned out not as friendly as the others, as he sicked a wicked monstrosity upon us.
Mr. Overgrown Rose turned out to be nothing more than a pushover for a trio of high-level Roundabouts. After pushing him down, our NPC became much more cooperative... and a quick trip back to sandy for one last cutscene, and BOOM! Part 1 of the mission complete... I'll be working on the Windy part of this mission later in the week, and with luck we'll soon be ready for the next big BC battle to come.
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Dynamis - Xarcabard, TMO Style...:
Being one of the newest members of TMO has it's perks, along with it comes membership in DynamisTMO, who's tuesday night raids are free to TMO members. It just so happens that this tuesday night we would hit the baddest dynamis of them all once again... Xarcabard. In comparing DyanmisTMO to FF, a few things I've noticed... one, DynamisTMO is right to the point, we don't screw around trying to farm eyes or demons. We hit the targets we need, and move on... 2nd, they also use a lot of sucicide pulls (thanks to Myanith and Edarion) resulting in less agro. This evenings run started rather worrysome though, as we began with only 2 blm's in the entire group, myself and Caladabog. Thankfully the group did an awesome job keeping the pulls to a minimum, and we did eventually pick up 2 more blm's for the run later during the raid. We managed to clear through the NM's and the wall of doom with nearly 2 hours left to go. After a light amount of farming, we started the long climb up the hill... wiping vanguard dragon after vanguard dragon, then eventually dealing with the draconic brothers, Ying and Yang... then, at last... our final prey...
With the mages perched on a higher level to avoid the worst effects of DL's incredible powers, the paladins pulled hate and used every trick in the book to keep it. Meanwhile, the sizable number of rdm/drk's we had would keep DL pinned down with chainspell stuns while the black mages unloaded loads of heavy nukes. For the first 50% of his health, it was going great... then, disaster...
How, or for that matter, why it happened, we don't know... but DL, despite mutliple PLD's on him trying to hold hate, turned, marched up the ramp... and right for the mages... and one Oblivion Smash pretty much ended our night. Oh well, we'll get him next time up in Xarcabard... to have managed to do this with only 50 total people at the end is quite an accomplishment (FF wusses out if they don't have 64).
In all, quite a week... and hoping for much much more in the near future. Cya all soon. =)