Our first Proto-Omega!

To be honest, I was extremely nervous about our first Omega. Our group only has 14 members and only five of us had done Omega before. Our setup was following:

Tank party: NIN/DRK, PLD/NIN, WHM/SMN, RDM/DRK, BRD/WHM
BLM party: BLM/WHM x 5 + BRD/WHM
Melee party (erm trio): WHM/SMN, WAR/NIN, MNK/NIN

We kited it when it was on 2 feet and straight tanked when it was on 4 feet. Our BLMs used only tier III and IV for the first 75%. Our WAR voked the gunbods and we had two BLM casting tier IV to kill them. Since it was our first try, we didn't farm the pods.

For the last 25% after the last gunpod was dead our RDM/DRK used CS+Stun, PLD used Invincible, melees used 2hr and BLMs started to cast AM. We killed it with plenty of time to spare and got hands and head as drops. Congratulations guys!



I'm so proud of our little group, everyone played so well and did excatly as they were told to do! There weren't any problems and only one BLM died. Good job guys, I love you all! <3

ToAU 44 and other stuff

Yesterday made me remember why I actually like this game. For a while I have been only logging in because I have to, and it definitely hasn't been fun. Well, of course I have enjoyed doing dynamis and some other stuff, but mostly it hasn't been very enjoyable. Until last night.

We were doing ToAU mission 44, which is the much feared Alexander fight, probably the most difficult mission in the game currently. To be honest, I was pretty sure we wouldn't win, because I had heard so much horror stories about that mission, about losing again and again even when using The Most Optimal Setups. And well, our static - like all our LS statics - are based on who wants to do the missions, not on which jobs they have leveled.

Anyway, at first our setup was RDM/DRK, BLM/WHM, PLD/NIN, DRG/WHM, DRG/RDM and PUP/NIN (me). On the first try we wiped to the BLU guy and decided to just HP and go again. On the second try we knew we would run out of time, but we used it for a kind of "dry run" to see how Alexander is like. We got it maybe down to 75% before we wiped. Our third try didn't go well at all, and we decided to just give up, and at that point our second DRG needed to leave.

So, we replaced the DRG with a LS friend who had done the mission before. After that our setup was WHM/SMN, RDM/DRK, BLM/WHM, PLD/NIN, DRG/SAM and PUP/NIN (still me). We went in, tried again, got Alexander to 3% and got thrown out. But the good thing was, we weren't pissed off, we were laughing! It was so unbelievably funny and epic how we just kept throwing bodies at it and praying for the best... And it was so close in the end!

Because it had been so close and we were having so much fun, we decided not to give up just yet. We used a COR to get our 2hrs back and decided to give it one last try. Well, in the end, the next try failed and we decided to give up and come back, but anyway... On our sixth, final try, we finally won! It was really, really close though, because after we got the "You have 30 seconds left in the battlefield" message, Alexander had still a few % HP and he used the invinsible shield move which meant we couldn't damage him in any way. Luckily, it wore just a few seconds before time ran out, and then Alix used a WS and Red landed a spell to finish him off. I couldn't believe we actually made it! It wasn't an easy mission, but in my opinion, with a good team of friends, (almost) anything in this game is possible, if you just won't give up! And this one proved it, once again.



If someone is interested, I'll tell a bit about the strategy we used the time we won. This might be interesting for Puppetmasters at least. ^^

Raubahn Form One:

As soon as we entered, we ate food, used reraises, casted protectra & shellra and then ran away from the door and pulled Raubahn in to a corner where there was more space for mages to stay far. For the first and easiest form, we used mostly only magic damage. Our PLD was only melee engaged all the time, and our BLM, RDM and PUPs BLM automaton nuked him down. BLM and RDM also took turns stunning Eyes On Me. When he used 2hr, BLM and RDM kept stunning/sleeping him to prevent him from one-shotting us with EOM, but we never disengaged or stopped dealing damage. When he was around 20%, DRG engaged too.



Raubahn Form Two:

I changed my automaton to ranged frame (ranged to keep Comedie far enough to prevent her eating AoE) and meleed the second form down with PLD and DRG. BLM and RDM kept stunning / sleeping and we tried to take him down asap.

Raubahn Form Three:

Our strategy was simply "kill him asap and try to survive". The third form really sucked, but on our final try we got him down pretty fast. I continued using ranged frame, and I think Armor Piercer did around 800 damage on him. No one died while fighting Raubahn, and when he finally died the third time, our mages were ok with MP.

Razfahd

This was the easiest part of the mission, because he wasn't really able to hurt us in any way. We tried to get him down to 50% asap, using any damage available. While fighting him, I deactivated my automaton and changed back to the BLM frame for Alexander.

When we had gotten Razfahd down to 50%, we got the CS, and decided to rest full since we were really good with time (30 mins left or something like that). After that, we engaged Alexander. Our PLD/NIN stood in front of it (I don't remember if he was in melee distance in the end or not, but I think that he did melee). Mages were far away on both sides of Alexander (and so was my automaton, as far as possible) and me and DRG were meleeing on different sides of him. The positioning was extremely important, and somehow I managed to do it so that my automaton didn't take any of the AoE damage! That was really lucky, because her nukes did a lot more damage than my meleeing.

Our biggest problem during the fight was Alexanders 2hr, Divine Judgement, as we didn't really come up with any good strategy for it. On this final try, we tried to get our BLM to nuke away all his MP, grab hate and die to his 2hr while others ran away ("Because we're brave like that", as Alix said ;)). The problem was, our BLM actually died before he even used 2hr, and in the end, that situation became a full wipe. However, most of us succeeded to die in a safe place (well, everyone but the poor BLM who got drawn in), and we had plenty of time to reraise and recover. And when Alexander used his 2hr again when he was on about 4%, we succeeded to avoid it slightly better (I think).

In the end, I used about a stack of food, a reraise earring and whatnot for this mission, but it was all worth it, because WE WON! WON WON WON WON! And I got a cute grown and a nice ring! So it was totally worth it!



But really, the best thing was that it was so fun! It was such a great feeling to finish something this difficult with friends. I laughed so much yesterday, especially when we got thrown out from the battlefield when Alexander was on 3%, I had such a great time! Call me crazy, but those are the moments that make this game enjoyable for me!

Talking about enjoyable, we also had our first Limbus run with SecretFellowship! I decided we start with NE Apollyon, because it's the most easy Limbus zone I know. And it was really almost perfect, we finished the zone with about half an hour left or something. Red kind off took the lead there, but I didn't mind, because well, he's just so good at it. It's just a bit amusing because he's always telling how much he hates leading stuff, so I just had to tease him about it. Anyway, I love our group, and I'm really looking forward to our future runs!





Also, the Einherjar group I recently left, finally got to do their first Odin and I promised to help. And, we got thrown out when he was at 1-3% HP. I'm pretty annoyed because that will most likely be the one and only time I never get to fight him (because well, I'm really not interested in doing Einherjar), so I wanted the experience and the title and the memory... But well, I guess I will remember that time as the-time-when-we-I-almost-became-Elite-Einherjar.

Feeling tired

This has been a busy week for me. My courses at university have started and I've also had some other real life things to take care of. Most of the times I've logged in to FFXI, I've felt too tired to do anything. That means I've also been unable to offer my help to my LS friends, which has made me feel guilty. I don't want anyone to think me as a bitch who never helps anyone... But well, I wrote my thoughts on our linkshell forums and some other members wrote their thoughts aswell and it has been a good discussion in my opinion.

This week I decided to help more and bitch less in all events. I'm trying to learn that sometimes it's best to just stay quiet. I'm not the leader and I don't have to take leaders role or responsibility. For now it has been working ok, I think, but I'm afraid the dynamis on Sunday will be the real test for me. ^^;

We did Omega and Ultima on Limbus this week. Both were a bit messy and felt a lot more difficult than the last time we did them. Especially in Ultima people died a lot (but I used my secret bard survival skills and didn't die once!). But well, at least we won.



I also finally got enough coins to upgrade first AF to +1. I'll do BRD hands first (Singing skill +10!) as soon as I'll understand how the redoing AF quests thing works...

We also killed Overlord Bakgodek with our HNMLS. The drops sucked. Horribly.



Yesterday I had a day off. I woke up around 3-4 PM... When I logged in, I decided to help my friend camp Okotes. No drop, again, unfortunately. Some very stupid people had complained to him in party about not having Okotes and that it was stupid for a SAM to use Woodsmans and he should get Snipers instead... I felt like /slapping those guys in the head. Seriously, my friend is playing his first and highest job in game, he has an awesome gear and then people complain him about having two Woodsmans instead of Snipers...



Yesterday evening we had a ZNM run. We popped Iriz Ima, Wulgaru, Gotoh Zha the Redolent and Iriri Samariri. All the others went well, but we wiped to Iriri Samariri when it was around 12%. It was our first time doing that mob and we only had 13 people, so we knew it was a bit risky. But well, it was good experience. Wulgaru was my pop and I was hoping to get a Hissho Hachimaki, but I didn't have any luck. Actually, none of us seemed to have a really nice luck, though we got one pair of Enkidu's hands.

Killing big meanies (and some players too)

I have only one week of vacation left before my studies at the university begin again. I'm really looking foward to studying again! This year I'm studying whole new subjects, mostly education (I'm studying to become a teacher). I'm also planning to start studying Japanese, but I'm not sure if I'll do it at the university or at an adult education center. Anyway, I've been thinking about taking a little break from FFXI to focus on my studies again. Maybe a week or two, maybe more, I don't know, but I definitely could use one. We'll see.

Anyway, on this week I've done quite a lot in game. On Monday we had a great Limbus run. We did Apollyon S/E with 11 people, it was an easy win and we got a nice amount of coins. Also there were several drops, though half of them floored. Anyway, I can't remember when was the last time I've had such a great time doing Limbus! People seemed to be on a relaxed mood, no one complained about anything, we were joking and it was really fun.



Also, I did the biggest damage weapon skill I've done so far:



For some reason the mob got mad at me after that. ^^;

After Limbus we had an assault static run with two of our members missing. We got replacements for them from out linkshell and decided to do a Lebros Cavern PFC assault Lebros Supplies which I still hadn't done. That assault sucked more than any assault I've ever done! I mean seriously, on wiki it seemed so easy (just run from NPC to NPC avoiding aggro) but somehow we got loads and loads of aggro and people just kept dying. On the first try we lost it and I felt really horrible, because I knew no one wanted to do it and the only reason we did it was because I hadn't still done it (I was ill the last time they had done it). Well, we decided to try again, and we made it on the second try. There were still deaths though, and I felt really horrible about them. After that everyone swore they'd never ever do that assault again, me included.

On Tuesday I decided to get a bit EXP for my BRD. I got a nice merit party (the setup was a dream: RDM, BRD, NIN and 3 x SAM) and the whole colibri camp area was empty! I dinged 75 before I could say it and got a really nice buffer too. Next I'll focus on getting my PUP to 75 and gearing and meriting all my jobs like crazy.

After exping I asked if one of our linkshell members still needed help with his PLD AF weapon fight. He said yes so we decided to go do it. I had just done the fight a while ago for my husband, so I knew where it was, how it was like and so on. So I geared PUP/WHM, met my friend in Jeuno and teled us to Holla. I remembered that the mob (an elemental) had hit my husbands char very hard when he had popped it, so I told my friend he should Flash it so that it will miss him. Well, I have to say that was a horribly stupid idea. I had no idea flash would generate so much hate. So, my friend died, and I felt like a total idiot. The saddest thing was, I was PUP/WHM but I didn't have enough MP for raise and no MP gear with me... So I had to ask my husband to bring his character to raise our friend. Well, at least he got his AF weapon, even though everything went wrong.



While we were waiting for my husband to come to the rescue, I had fun playing with my BLM puppet. I haven't used it for a long time, so I had never seen it cast tier III nukes before. I decided to tease some bunnies and test them.



Yesterday I helped a new linkshell member with his Sandy rank 2 mission. I also showed him how to get to the Dunes, and we got him tele-dem and holla crystals. He seems like a great guy and I had a great time with him.



When my friend Shokun logged in, I asked him if he'd like to come farm some sea organs with me again. We spent maybe 2 or even 3 hours in Sea and this time even got some drops. When we were just talking about how we were starting to get bored with organ farming, a friend of ours who was camping Charybdis told us it had popped. So we ran to help him. We had a NIN, RDM (who wanted the joytoy), BRD (me) and WHM. Things were smooth and easy until our NIN had to go afk in the middle of the fight and he died. And then the rest of us died too... So we called some reinforcements (another NIN and a THF(?)) just in case, reraised and rested. At one point I was moving to a safer spot to rest when my sneak suddenly wore. I kept running becaue I thought I didn't get aggro. When I was next to our WHM, something smacked me hard and I died... and then it proceeded to kill the WHM too. I felt so sorry, it was such a stupid mistake from me. Anyway, when we all were gathered and unweakened, we claimed and killed it again and of course got the sword for our RDM friend. A happy ending is happy.



After the Charybdis we had to hurry to our HNMLS event. We were going to try Bahamut v. 2. The fight went really well for some time, but (in my opinion) we didn't have enough stunners and WHMs, so after a couple of Gigaflares got off, we wiped. We got him to 20% and he didn't summon anything in that time, so I think it was ok for our first try.



After failed Bahamut v. 2 we decided to do Ouryu, which went a lot better. It was a long but a fun fight, I was there as BRD and was quite busy the whole time.







Today I haven't done anything in game. Our social LS has ENM + promy run today but I left myself out of the setup because I had to do it to someone. I have limbus and assault this evening, but before that I think I'll just do something else than play.

Raging Flamingos

I've been a bit ill for the last couple of days so I haven't really done much but played. My sister and her boyfriend were going to come to visit us this weekend but I had to cancel it. I was really looking foward to seeing them so I'm a bit sad about it.

Since I've been ill, I haven't done much anything else but played FFXI. On Wednesday I helped a LS member with his Rank 5 mission. Now all of our active members are at least Rank 5 and we can do Rank 6 together soon. I took this screenshot when we were doing the mission, meet Evy the Galka:



On Wednesday evening we had a Sea run which didn't go very well. I felt really ill and tired and found it difficult to concentrate. I guess I should've just logged out but I hate missing events (in fact, I've never missed a Dynamis run or an event of my HNMLS). Well, we killed the Ix'Aern DRG and Ix'Aern DRK and the DRK dropped the RDM cape (and only reraised once!). But when we were hunting another DRK, somehow many people got lost and died, and that's when the chaos began. I got lost and died too and for the first time ever I was told not to reraise (I was BRD/WHM) but wait for a R3. I guess our leader wants my BRD to get to 75 really bad. ^^ Well, anyway we were splitted all over The Garden of Ru'Hmet, some of us dead, and most of us didn't seem to have any idea about where to go. So our leader told us the event was over and we warped away.

The thing is, our leader said that people should've studied the maps and know how to move around. While I agree with him, I'm really horrible with all maps. I mean I can get lost in East Ronfaure, seriously! And it really isn't that easy to move around in a place of which you have no map (that's the only Sea map I don't have). I always have the map open on my laptop when I'm running around there, but it isn't that easy to try to follow someone, check my position from the in-game map which I don't have, focus things on my screen and check the map from wiki... I guess I should really get the map of that area, but it's impossible for me to solo, so I'll need to gather a group maybe.

Yesterday I decided to get my PUP a little EXP and skillups. I headed to Sky and decided to try to fight Flamingos there.



Yeah, they look all cute and pink but I'm quite sure they have some kind of hidden rage mode. At times it seemed to impossible to keep my shadows up because their attack speed just seemed crazy. But it was ok when Comedie kept Slow, Paralyze and Bio II on them most of the time. The birds checked Decent Challenge - Tough and they weren't too difficult. Exp wasn't amazing, but it was ok, and skill ups were great!



The best thing was, these birds dropped 3 coffer keys for me and I left Sky 50K richer! ^^ Hunting for coffers was fun, too, I don't know any other zone where coffers are hidden like they are in Sky.



After I got bored with exping, I asked if anyone in the LS wanted to do a BCNM run. I didn't have enough my seals for an orb myself, but I knew other people had, and I also know some of our LS members have never done BCNMs before so they might be a bit shy to organize a run even if they wanted to. So we did Royal Jelly, 3 orbs, and one of them dropped Utsu: Ni. That person is now 2/5 on those, he seems to have a very good luck. I think most of us have had a Ni drop from this BCNM (well, of course, not me), so it seems to be really worth of seals. And the best thing is, it's really easy and can be done in (almost) any setup, we haven't lost it once.

After the BCNM I decided to go to farm a bit, this time on my level 11 SAM. I had almost two hours to spend before limbus and in that time I got two levels and a nice amount of silk, beehive chips and honey. I also noticed I like SAM more than DRG, and I think that may be the job I level after I get my BRD and PUP to 75.



When we we're on our way to Limbus later, one of us got ufo aggro and we decided to kill it. First it seemed to be going really well, but then melees (me included) succeeded to get some nice links from the TP mobs and we all wiped. I really hate those things!



The Limbus itself was just epic! First of all, our puller pulled too fast leaving two of our members outside (and one of them was one of our tanks). However, anything went really well before the last floor, where the puller pulled ALL the mobs at the same time. It turned out that those gobs really didn't feel tired enough to stay asleep and we all wiped after killing some of the mobs.

So we were all dead and we didn't have much time left (we had less than 10 minutes). So we had no option but to chainspell and R1 all. When we were all up, we got the 5 minutes notice. There were 3 mobs left, so we decided to rest full HP and zerg them as weakened with our 2hr. I was sure we'd wipe again to the first Bomb Toss, but the plan seemed to work surprisingly well. In fact, we were already killing the last mob when we got the 1 minute notice. The bad thing was, at that moment, the gob decided to cast Sleepga II and we all fell asleep... My heart was beating so fast, I couldn't believe one stupid sleep spell would prevent us from winning. But you know, miracles do happen! The gob was stupid enough to use Bomb Toss soon after the sleepga, so we all woke up and succeeded to kill it and win with I-don't-want-to-think-about-how-many seconds left. Good times!

I also got the MNK item, so I now have both items for both MNK and BRD! That means I can't lot anything for a long time, but I need to save coins anyway.

The usual stuff with some friend list drama

On the last couple of days, I've spent a few hours farming in Saruta on my DRG. In those few hours I got many stacks of wind and earth crystals, silk, honey and beehive chips. They also took my DRG from level 10 to 14 which I'm happy about.



I also ended up removing a person from my friend list. The person had been on my friend list for a while (like 2 months maybe) after one party we both were in. He didn't talk to me often but every time he did, he seemed to want help with something. I really didn't enjoy being the person you only talk to when you need something, so I had been thinking about removing him from my friend list almost as long as he had been there. Well, the day before yesterday he finally crossed the line.

He had just dinged 75 on his highest job so he wanted Walahra Turban. He then realized he didn't have enough imperial gold coins, so he (logically???) decided to ask if I want to give him some.



So... First of all, I don't even know this guy! Yes, he's on my friend list, but he has only talked to me when he has needed help with something. So what makes him assume he has the right to even ask me to give him items worth of nice money? Sure, I don't mind borrowing my friends (the people I know and who also help me every once in a while) something like that, but this guy was talking about giving the coins to him and I don't even know him! He has never ever helped me with anything, or even wanted to know anything about me. Some friendship, huh?

I think the funniest part was when he said about not being able to buy the coins because he's saving gil for his (Shura) togi. This person doesn't even have Sky access! And I have three Shura abj. in my MH at the moment, waiting for me to save enough gil or points for the cursed items. But of course I should use some money for his Shura gear first, right? ...right...

Anyway, I logged out, removed him from my friend list, and logged back in. After that, I politely told him I was sorry but I felt like he was just using me to get things he wants, and that I don't like people like that being on my friend list.

On Monday we had Limbus which we won easily even though one of our two PLDs got d/c just before the last floor. We did Apoyllon, and a BRD item dropped. I got it, so I now have both items for one AF+1. I think I'll do the hands first, I just need some coins.



Yesterday was the first run of the ENM static I organized! We did a level cap 40 3 person ENM Fire in the Sky in Monarch Linn. I was a bit nervous but we won extremely easily. Our setup was RDM/BLM, BLM/WHM and BRD/WHM (me). BLM had only time to cast 2 nukes before the mob died so it was a fast win. Unfortunately nothing good dropped, but at least we now have experience with this ENM.



I also got to a merit party with my BRD. I was nervous because I had never pulled in a merit party before and I had never been to this camp (Mamool Ja staging point) with BRD. But it went surprisinly well, exp/h was around 15-20K and I pulled fast enough all the time. My highest chain was #42, then the melees didn't kill the mob fast enough (yeah, blame the melees! ^^). I still need practice with keeping all songs up and chains going, but I think I did well enough for my first merit party.

Feeling guilty

I had a horrible day yesterday. First of all, I waked up at 8AM and I was tired as hell. I just wanted to go back to sleep but I had some important things to do so I had to go out. When I came back home, I started to study. I didn't get one book for my exam until yesterday so I had only one day to read it. So I read until I felt my brain was going to explode.

At 10PM my time we did a Limbus run in Temenos and a BRD item dropped. My BRD is only level 71 at the moment, but I've been asked to use it mostly in all events. I haven't been doing Limbus long and I wasn't sure about our lotting rules, so I asked who could lot it. One person wanted the item, but it turned out that he already had one piece of BRD AF +1 and our rules say that in those situations persons without any AF +1 should be able to lot first. So they told me to lot, the other person passed, and I got the item.



I said I hope we'll get another drop on the same run so the other person can have the item too. Then they told me it was a really rare drop and he had been waiting it for 6 months... I felt so bad for him, if I had known that, I would've passed the item. But it got even worse... Our point person said that I had a right to lot it because BRD was my main lot and only the secondary lot of the other person. Well, BRD isn't my main lot... He had messed it up and in the end it wouldn't have been my lot at all. So a person had waited for an item for half a year and then some noob in the LS comes and lots it even though he had every right to lot it. I felt so horrible, so guilty the whole evening because of that. I really hope another BRD will drop soon and he'll get it.

But I also have some happy news! Yesterday I decided to spend all my gil for Ancient Beastcoins so I could get something very nice for my Bard:



I'm loving it!

Also, yesterday after Limbus we did four assaults with our static, and I finally got promoted to Sergeant Major (I don't think I've done any new assaults for this promotion so it certainly took some time). The promotion quest was one of the most disturbing ones I've seen:



I'm so happy it's weekend now and I finally have some time to relax and play. We'll do some ZNMs today and I'm looking foward to it, but before Sunday I don't have anything else planned. I think I might farm a bit and maybe level my Bard.