Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)
Warning: Long and rambling post on many things
happening recently.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
First, a few tidbits about Saviours:
As one might expect, we're not a large guild; we field
twenty to thirty people most raids. This is pretty much
inevitable given that we start raiding 9am Eastern time.
We are not exaclty rejects; our behaviour is generally
good. But we are leftovers, unable or unwilling to raid
"normal" hours. So we are sort of a family guild, large
enough to raid mid-size targets, like farming OOW spell
runes.
Given our limited numbers, we don't have the most even
balance of classes. We are heavy on tanks and druids.
Our most regular cleric dosen't even have his epic 1.0,
though we have made that a priority target lately. Our
only regular chanter has to leave for work around 10:30,
often in mid-raid. And she 3-boxes, taking three valuable
characters off the table, though some others come on to
replace her as the day goes on.
The core members are Time-geared and have hundreds
of AA's; our druid officer has over 1000. Leader is a
bard, with the usual bard penchant for brightly colored
armor. ("Do not move past the traffic cone...") One tank
boxes a wizard with 350 AA's and the spell Ancient:Core
Fire, the ultimate wizard nuke, so he's king of the big crits
for us. But the bots aren't always with us, so the guild
relies on Adas and another single-box wizard for high DPS.
The other wizard, and most of the rest of the guild for that
matter, has fewer AA's than Adas, and is still collocting
OOW tier 1 gear - some quested, some rare drops like Veil
of the Windstrider, or Slaver's Buckler of Station from
Slavedriver Menlo. Adas has her gear complete, so she
can save up for the bigger drops ahead. For AA's, I recently
bought Druzzil's Mystical Familiar to boost Thundaka yields;
it will be a long time before I get Corona Flare or ACF.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The karmic wheel turns, nut just for me sometimes, but for
the guild.
Wednesday: I had spent the past week at low karma, having
bad luck with rolls and group formation and deaths. I laid low,
doing only what was asked, trying to stay strictly within raid
orders, taking no chances. I was forced to miss a raid due to
a doctor's appointment, my first miss. This turned out not to
be much, as I found out we spent most of the day figuring out
and epic 1.5 fight in Dragon Necropolis, not yet successfully.
Wednesdays and Sundays are our xp-group days, and I was
taken into our RSS group that day. Several hours there got me
three AA's and some real xp as a buffer against numerous raid
deaths. (Those 4% losses from click-rezzes can add up.) One
of our tanks got his coveted Celestial Lorica, a chest upgrade;
another, going after the same thing, had to log before another
one could drop. We also got a Glowing Muramite Rune, which
went to our cleric, and a Greater Rune, which I was awarded -
Adas' first level 69 spell.
Alla's lists the first level 69 wizard spell as Ether Ward, 40%
spell damage mitigation for up to 1300 total, a Manasink upgrade.
Somewhat useful in fights against named with huge AE's, like
ESR, Emoush, or Velitorkin. But Karsor dosen't give me Ether
Ward; he gives me Meteor Storm, a rain yeilding 886 damage per
wave.
This seems like a step backward. One of my level 66 spells was
Tears of the Sun, a rain for 1168 damage per wave. Meteor Storm
doing less damage, in spite of being higher level, seems suspicious.
That night, as I log back on, I get a perfect chance to test my
suspicions: our senior necro is calling in favors to build a force for
his final epic fight against Tarlang, a battle I know well. When
the red-con Tarlang is engaged, I have both MS and TotS up.
They prove to be exclusive: when I cast one, the other is also
blacked out on the same timer. TotS, as usual, is resisted, fully
or partially, most of the time.
Meteor Storm is never resisted. Every single wave does full damage.
Apparently, it is the "lure-rain" Tears of Arlyxir was supposed to be
(and maybe was, briefly, when it was introduced). So that tells me
where it belongs in my lineup.
Before lgging that night, I get some screenshots of Gukta; I had
heard rumors the trolls were about to retake it.
Thursday was patch day. Nothing could be done.
Thrusday night, I log in on my SK to explore Grobb. The city is
indeed under old management. Several frogloks are imprisoned.
I had never actually seen the city like this, having started playing
during the Ykesha era, but it didn't seem impressive. Note that
many mobs in Allakhazam's Mob Graveyard are back from the
dead...
Next, shift to Rabotev for a fast trip into the Rathe Mountains.
Oh, the horror! The original plat farm is no more! Yes, it was long
since obsolete, with the loot available from places like Dulak, but
still, another element of the old game is history. Those two guards
at the tower on the hill are probably relieved: now they aren't getting
constantly killed by giants. They can handle the yard-trash mobs
around them now.
I hear tell frogloks can now be rogues, necros, or shadow knights.
Didn't see any trainers for these classes at the tents. Maybe they're
elsewhere in the zone. I did find the new PoK book - fat lot of good
it does now! A PoK stone to the Rathe Mountains, traded for giving
up the original reason to go there! At least the stopnes in PoK are
a little more balanced now, one near Rivervale balancing the Gunthak
stone on the other side. Now, what would balance the Arena stone...?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday, at 9am roll call, aviours is forming up when the bombshell is
dropped. Adastraea has earned full membership.
I was more nervous than anything else, really. I suppose it's my nature;
a paltry few weeks with a group of starangers isn't enough for me to
stop thinking I have to prove myself to them. Granted, they must have
decided they could not be very strict about Kod'Taz access as a
requirement for recruits, given the difficulty of getting it. But I still
felt
I had to get it as quickly as possible.
That day, we hit Menlo again; I was now able to roll on the runes he
dropped, and won one, which turned out to be Spark of Ice. About
as much damage as Icebane, but not strong against resists, fast casting,
and cheap; useful in trash-clearing situations against things weak
against ice.
By the time Menlo is down, we have 40 people on line, about as many
as it is possible for us to have. We decide to go for RZ, and call in
favors.
Some people have to leave, some come in. A surprising number of us
aren't flagged for Tactics; we will have to do MB sometime soon.
But that will wait. We go in, buff up, head out, clearing our way
upstairs. I start noticing stange graphical errors: sections of the
floor fail to render, leaving lower areas visible from the outside.
Then something really freaky happens: our spell gems get bugged;
no one can cast anything. This happens with four mobs in camp.
The miracle is that any of us survived at all. In fact, quite a few of
us do. But we can't cast anything. We camp out to clear the problem.
No help. Clearing the spell gems and rememming all spells fixes the
problem. But it's a bad sign.
In the end, our leader develops another odd problem with targetting,
camps to clear it, and never comes back. The raid that seemed so
promising when it started has to be called off. But we mark Saturday to
try again.
Of course, we don't get nearly so many on Saturday. We can only hit
up Menlo again and then do xp groups. I do help form a group for DoN
tasks in the Ascent and Thundercrest Isles - regular version, not instanced.
This gets Adas ready for Emoush, and others ready for raids beyond that.
Sunday, almost no one is on, and nothing is done.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday, we take another crack at Dragon Necropolis. Some of our
people have never been to this zone before, and have to be shown around.
The fight is a tricky one, requiring great discpline. It is timed, 15
minutes
from engagement. Three human necros and four liches have to die one
by one. They don't assist each other directly, but they each have two pets,
which prox aggro; they are also tethered, and gain power each time they
snap back to their stations. Our leader kites them away as we kill the
necros;
as each one dies, his/her/its pets despawn. When the last one dies, we
get hit with a poison AE from the leader on the tomb-ramp; everyone in
the area *should* be behind the tomb when this happens to avoid it,
but we don't realize this quite yet. We are able to keep up with group
heals,
but lost the fight due to melee push: the guy gets knocked off the tomb
is harder to target and apply DPS to on the ground with his back against
a wall. We barely run out of time the first run.
Second run, too many people creep up toward the necros as we clear
them; their pets are smart enough to go after the larger group threatening
their masters, and wipe us out.
Third try, only our first group gets close to the necros; I hang safely
back, uneasy, letting them do their job. Our leader takes a bad clip form
the pets he's kiting. This is actually good for us: he can now maintain
the pets' attention better due to low health. But one of our clerics
does the natural thing and heals him, drawing aggro and several
pets come and wipe out the engaging group. Now suffering raid
fatigue, we call it a day, and form xp groups. Just a little more
discipline,
and we can have this one done. As is, we get DKP inflation as people
pile up points for the time spent with no drops to award.
Our leader does stay online long enough to run through another
Tipt trial. I am called again, and eagerly join. By now we can practically
do this blindfolded; we run through smoothly, like the proverbial
fecal matter through waterfowl, killing a few choice mobs and lulling
our way past others. I am promised 90 minutes start to finish, but it
takes less than half that before we face Kyv Heartstriker Jhiru.
It is said Jhiru hits harder the farther you fight him from his station.
But to fight him there, you have to clear all other mobs nearby.
To speed things up, we prefer to clear one corner and fight him
there with a beefy tank and two healers, cleric and druid, and
hope slow lands early. As happens this time, we get Jhiru to 40%
when our tank goes down. I'm not sure who he goes after then,
but am surprised it isn't Adas; usually she's high on the aggro
list. Since we can't lst long like this, I finish casting another
Tears of the Sun, then, since a long cast is in order, I throw
the dice on a Manaburn. Either it will land, or Adas will be dead.
It lands, with Jhiru at 20%. He may hit hard, but he's a blue con,
and dosen't actually have that many hit points. Bang, he's dead,
grats us. Naturally, what he drops, we don't need; we have better
(DRU-MNK-BST bracer, we only have a druid, with full Time gear).
A little more running around, and Adas zones into Kod'Taz on her
own. Yxxta xp groups and Ikkinz raids beckon.
I should get to feeling like family soon...
EJH
On Bertoxxulous:
[70 Wizard] Adastraea Starwind (High Elf) of Erollisi Marr <Saviours>
[61 Druid] Rabotev Startree (Wood Elf) of Tunare
[45 Warrior] Gruggoredil Dullwit (Barbarian) of Rallos Zek
[50 Monk] Tosev Starfist (human) of Quellious
[48 Shadow Knight] Neuveniu Sinstorm (Dark Elf) of Innoruuk
[50 Cleric] Celune (High Elf) of Tunare
[42 Beastlord] Grukyn (Vah Shir)
On Drinal:
[24 Bard] Greban (Vah Shir)
[32 Magician] Cadwen (High Elf)
On Firiona Vie:
[32 Cleric] Adastra Peraspera (High Elf) of Tunare
On Quellious:
[31 Wizard] Phrogment (Froglok) of Mithaniel Marr
[35 Ranger] Keaolasi (Wood Elf) of Tunare
[3 Paladin] Caeinye (High Elf) of Tunare
Warning: Long and rambling post on many things
happening recently.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
First, a few tidbits about Saviours:
As one might expect, we're not a large guild; we field
twenty to thirty people most raids. This is pretty much
inevitable given that we start raiding 9am Eastern time.
We are not exaclty rejects; our behaviour is generally
good. But we are leftovers, unable or unwilling to raid
"normal" hours. So we are sort of a family guild, large
enough to raid mid-size targets, like farming OOW spell
runes.
Given our limited numbers, we don't have the most even
balance of classes. We are heavy on tanks and druids.
Our most regular cleric dosen't even have his epic 1.0,
though we have made that a priority target lately. Our
only regular chanter has to leave for work around 10:30,
often in mid-raid. And she 3-boxes, taking three valuable
characters off the table, though some others come on to
replace her as the day goes on.
The core members are Time-geared and have hundreds
of AA's; our druid officer has over 1000. Leader is a
bard, with the usual bard penchant for brightly colored
armor. ("Do not move past the traffic cone...") One tank
boxes a wizard with 350 AA's and the spell Ancient:Core
Fire, the ultimate wizard nuke, so he's king of the big crits
for us. But the bots aren't always with us, so the guild
relies on Adas and another single-box wizard for high DPS.
The other wizard, and most of the rest of the guild for that
matter, has fewer AA's than Adas, and is still collocting
OOW tier 1 gear - some quested, some rare drops like Veil
of the Windstrider, or Slaver's Buckler of Station from
Slavedriver Menlo. Adas has her gear complete, so she
can save up for the bigger drops ahead. For AA's, I recently
bought Druzzil's Mystical Familiar to boost Thundaka yields;
it will be a long time before I get Corona Flare or ACF.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The karmic wheel turns, nut just for me sometimes, but for
the guild.
Wednesday: I had spent the past week at low karma, having
bad luck with rolls and group formation and deaths. I laid low,
doing only what was asked, trying to stay strictly within raid
orders, taking no chances. I was forced to miss a raid due to
a doctor's appointment, my first miss. This turned out not to
be much, as I found out we spent most of the day figuring out
and epic 1.5 fight in Dragon Necropolis, not yet successfully.
Wednesdays and Sundays are our xp-group days, and I was
taken into our RSS group that day. Several hours there got me
three AA's and some real xp as a buffer against numerous raid
deaths. (Those 4% losses from click-rezzes can add up.) One
of our tanks got his coveted Celestial Lorica, a chest upgrade;
another, going after the same thing, had to log before another
one could drop. We also got a Glowing Muramite Rune, which
went to our cleric, and a Greater Rune, which I was awarded -
Adas' first level 69 spell.
Alla's lists the first level 69 wizard spell as Ether Ward, 40%
spell damage mitigation for up to 1300 total, a Manasink upgrade.
Somewhat useful in fights against named with huge AE's, like
ESR, Emoush, or Velitorkin. But Karsor dosen't give me Ether
Ward; he gives me Meteor Storm, a rain yeilding 886 damage per
wave.
This seems like a step backward. One of my level 66 spells was
Tears of the Sun, a rain for 1168 damage per wave. Meteor Storm
doing less damage, in spite of being higher level, seems suspicious.
That night, as I log back on, I get a perfect chance to test my
suspicions: our senior necro is calling in favors to build a force for
his final epic fight against Tarlang, a battle I know well. When
the red-con Tarlang is engaged, I have both MS and TotS up.
They prove to be exclusive: when I cast one, the other is also
blacked out on the same timer. TotS, as usual, is resisted, fully
or partially, most of the time.
Meteor Storm is never resisted. Every single wave does full damage.
Apparently, it is the "lure-rain" Tears of Arlyxir was supposed to be
(and maybe was, briefly, when it was introduced). So that tells me
where it belongs in my lineup.
Before lgging that night, I get some screenshots of Gukta; I had
heard rumors the trolls were about to retake it.
Thursday was patch day. Nothing could be done.
Thrusday night, I log in on my SK to explore Grobb. The city is
indeed under old management. Several frogloks are imprisoned.
I had never actually seen the city like this, having started playing
during the Ykesha era, but it didn't seem impressive. Note that
many mobs in Allakhazam's Mob Graveyard are back from the
dead...
Next, shift to Rabotev for a fast trip into the Rathe Mountains.
Oh, the horror! The original plat farm is no more! Yes, it was long
since obsolete, with the loot available from places like Dulak, but
still, another element of the old game is history. Those two guards
at the tower on the hill are probably relieved: now they aren't getting
constantly killed by giants. They can handle the yard-trash mobs
around them now.
I hear tell frogloks can now be rogues, necros, or shadow knights.
Didn't see any trainers for these classes at the tents. Maybe they're
elsewhere in the zone. I did find the new PoK book - fat lot of good
it does now! A PoK stone to the Rathe Mountains, traded for giving
up the original reason to go there! At least the stopnes in PoK are
a little more balanced now, one near Rivervale balancing the Gunthak
stone on the other side. Now, what would balance the Arena stone...?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friday, at 9am roll call, aviours is forming up when the bombshell is
dropped. Adastraea has earned full membership.
I was more nervous than anything else, really. I suppose it's my nature;
a paltry few weeks with a group of starangers isn't enough for me to
stop thinking I have to prove myself to them. Granted, they must have
decided they could not be very strict about Kod'Taz access as a
requirement for recruits, given the difficulty of getting it. But I still
felt
I had to get it as quickly as possible.
That day, we hit Menlo again; I was now able to roll on the runes he
dropped, and won one, which turned out to be Spark of Ice. About
as much damage as Icebane, but not strong against resists, fast casting,
and cheap; useful in trash-clearing situations against things weak
against ice.
By the time Menlo is down, we have 40 people on line, about as many
as it is possible for us to have. We decide to go for RZ, and call in
favors.
Some people have to leave, some come in. A surprising number of us
aren't flagged for Tactics; we will have to do MB sometime soon.
But that will wait. We go in, buff up, head out, clearing our way
upstairs. I start noticing stange graphical errors: sections of the
floor fail to render, leaving lower areas visible from the outside.
Then something really freaky happens: our spell gems get bugged;
no one can cast anything. This happens with four mobs in camp.
The miracle is that any of us survived at all. In fact, quite a few of
us do. But we can't cast anything. We camp out to clear the problem.
No help. Clearing the spell gems and rememming all spells fixes the
problem. But it's a bad sign.
In the end, our leader develops another odd problem with targetting,
camps to clear it, and never comes back. The raid that seemed so
promising when it started has to be called off. But we mark Saturday to
try again.
Of course, we don't get nearly so many on Saturday. We can only hit
up Menlo again and then do xp groups. I do help form a group for DoN
tasks in the Ascent and Thundercrest Isles - regular version, not instanced.
This gets Adas ready for Emoush, and others ready for raids beyond that.
Sunday, almost no one is on, and nothing is done.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Monday, we take another crack at Dragon Necropolis. Some of our
people have never been to this zone before, and have to be shown around.
The fight is a tricky one, requiring great discpline. It is timed, 15
minutes
from engagement. Three human necros and four liches have to die one
by one. They don't assist each other directly, but they each have two pets,
which prox aggro; they are also tethered, and gain power each time they
snap back to their stations. Our leader kites them away as we kill the
necros;
as each one dies, his/her/its pets despawn. When the last one dies, we
get hit with a poison AE from the leader on the tomb-ramp; everyone in
the area *should* be behind the tomb when this happens to avoid it,
but we don't realize this quite yet. We are able to keep up with group
heals,
but lost the fight due to melee push: the guy gets knocked off the tomb
is harder to target and apply DPS to on the ground with his back against
a wall. We barely run out of time the first run.
Second run, too many people creep up toward the necros as we clear
them; their pets are smart enough to go after the larger group threatening
their masters, and wipe us out.
Third try, only our first group gets close to the necros; I hang safely
back, uneasy, letting them do their job. Our leader takes a bad clip form
the pets he's kiting. This is actually good for us: he can now maintain
the pets' attention better due to low health. But one of our clerics
does the natural thing and heals him, drawing aggro and several
pets come and wipe out the engaging group. Now suffering raid
fatigue, we call it a day, and form xp groups. Just a little more
discipline,
and we can have this one done. As is, we get DKP inflation as people
pile up points for the time spent with no drops to award.
Our leader does stay online long enough to run through another
Tipt trial. I am called again, and eagerly join. By now we can practically
do this blindfolded; we run through smoothly, like the proverbial
fecal matter through waterfowl, killing a few choice mobs and lulling
our way past others. I am promised 90 minutes start to finish, but it
takes less than half that before we face Kyv Heartstriker Jhiru.
It is said Jhiru hits harder the farther you fight him from his station.
But to fight him there, you have to clear all other mobs nearby.
To speed things up, we prefer to clear one corner and fight him
there with a beefy tank and two healers, cleric and druid, and
hope slow lands early. As happens this time, we get Jhiru to 40%
when our tank goes down. I'm not sure who he goes after then,
but am surprised it isn't Adas; usually she's high on the aggro
list. Since we can't lst long like this, I finish casting another
Tears of the Sun, then, since a long cast is in order, I throw
the dice on a Manaburn. Either it will land, or Adas will be dead.
It lands, with Jhiru at 20%. He may hit hard, but he's a blue con,
and dosen't actually have that many hit points. Bang, he's dead,
grats us. Naturally, what he drops, we don't need; we have better
(DRU-MNK-BST bracer, we only have a druid, with full Time gear).
A little more running around, and Adas zones into Kod'Taz on her
own. Yxxta xp groups and Ikkinz raids beckon.
I should get to feeling like family soon...
EJH
On Bertoxxulous:
[70 Wizard] Adastraea Starwind (High Elf) of Erollisi Marr <Saviours>
[61 Druid] Rabotev Startree (Wood Elf) of Tunare
[45 Warrior] Gruggoredil Dullwit (Barbarian) of Rallos Zek
[50 Monk] Tosev Starfist (human) of Quellious
[48 Shadow Knight] Neuveniu Sinstorm (Dark Elf) of Innoruuk
[50 Cleric] Celune (High Elf) of Tunare
[42 Beastlord] Grukyn (Vah Shir)
On Drinal:
[24 Bard] Greban (Vah Shir)
[32 Magician] Cadwen (High Elf)
On Firiona Vie:
[32 Cleric] Adastra Peraspera (High Elf) of Tunare
On Quellious:
[31 Wizard] Phrogment (Froglok) of Mithaniel Marr
[35 Ranger] Keaolasi (Wood Elf) of Tunare
[3 Paladin] Caeinye (High Elf) of Tunare
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