Time for a toy!

I think that pretty much sums up Sunday night :) This was [censored] #5 from the previous post. I wanted to surprise people at ZNMs tonight xD

Biiiiiiiig thanks goes out to Tasya & Slemp for camping this with me... especially Tasya who always said that she'd get me a Joytoy, plus left herself logged in to get time of death, then dragged me out there and sat me down in SSG to actually camp when the window opened, and somehow managed to drag Slemp along too. Yes, you can see how much I actually wanted to camp this, but Tassy insisted ^^;

I guess that also explains the lot :o

It was a surprisingly crowded camp... When we went to the camp, there was... I think 2-3 people standing around killing the pops as soon as they appeared. We think they were spooked by us when we showed up as within the next hour, the small party grew quickly to what looked like a full alliance o.o; Slemp pointed out that they were pretty slow in claiming mobs that popped in the room, and I think that he's right.

When Charby popped, I had time to target him, check the name before using Animated Flourish for the claim. I also saw Slemp starting to move towards him, but he was out of range since he popped right next to me. I guess Flash, while fast, still can't beat Animated Flourish either cos I got the claim xD

Our team was Slemp on NIN/WAR, Tassy on RDM/WHM, me on DNC/NIN. Surprisingly easy fight. Slemp pretty much tanked the whole fight, though he let me play with him a bit too. I managed to test out my evasion set vs. Charby and found that he missed quite a bit, over 50% of the time, maybe higher... My evasion set still needs one more piece so it's not quite complete yet, so this is quite encouraging for me :D The fight was very smooth, no problems. AoEs were quickly healed up, and Slemp didn't spend more than a half second without max HP. Tassy even got to nuke to speed things up!

The competition hung around as well, with lots of congratulations to me from the win xD Good to see friendly competition does exist out there :D

Fallout

Sadly... this also means that I'll have to merit Sword ; ; It's been sitting at 2/8 ever since I got BLU to level 75 waaaaaaaaaaay back when and I haven't touched it since :o I put the blame for this squarely on Tassy! /nod. And to think I was so close to being done... 18 more merits for Sword, another 10 to finish off HP, then I can be done again xD

I'm half considering selling my expensive Adder Jambiya... but part of me does not want to since it's a really good off-hand. It's one of the rare daggers with evasion, so it's a significant part of my evasion set, and the evasion down debuff is very useful. Pity my Ogre Jambiya attempt turned out to be such junk (another story on this later) otherwise I'd have more incentive to sell my Adder :(

So... that was the 2nd "dropped goal" that was finished so far from my list... I swear that you all are conspiring to make me look silly ^^;

Let's see... Joytoy was mainly for Dancer, though Paladin benefits hugely from it as well. I guess my Justice Sword can go into storage for a while... good thing too as getting Virtue Stones for that was literally killing me.. at least my SCH ^^;

Still to do on DNC:

- Get a Roundel Earring -- In progress... lots more gil needed here

- Novia Earring -- Also in progress

- Finish up Dex merits -- Hugely painful... not sure if I'd really want to do this... currently 1/5 on Dex merits x.x;;;

Big big big thank you again Tassy <3

Long big update time + lots of pics (and spoilers!)

Whee… big post time. I recently realized that some people who read my blog actually don’t play XI anymore, but still find it fun to read about what’s going on through my blog, so I’m going to do my best to take more pics and post them up here. Didn’t post pics last week, so this week’s Monday post will include some pics from the week before. I’ll also be posting some pics from the WotG missions which contain spoilers, so be warned!

Ok, first up… lots of updates on activities in FFXI.

#1: Big congrats to Spengler for last Thursday’s record Nyzul Isle run! Goliard boots AND Denali legs both in one night! This actually concludes our current “need” list, so our Nyzul group is taking a much needed break at the moment… didn’t get together last night, though if people are up for it, we can probably get together sometime in the future and either work on people’s “want” lists (2 Askar, 1 Golaird for me, Ghiren is eyeing Denali, plus I think Speng & Zu are still interested in some pieces?), help people climb (Teia, still out there? Saw you last night!) or do something else like ISNMs or doing regular assaults for people.

#2: Big congrats to Fuupup for his Hachiryu pants last Monday, followed by his Novio Earring on Tuesday! Talk about good stuff happening in pairs!

#3: Congrats to me and Vanh for… catching up completely with all the WotG missions! Especially big thanks to Vanh for duo-boxing the last two fights. Since Fuuji was busy on Sunday, the two of us got together and started working through the final few missions (and picked up a gobbiebag upgrade along the way) That’s it for WotG missions for us until the next update. Only thing left for me in WotG content is to finish up the last few Bastok quests.

#4: Big big thanks to Tassy for helping me farm up some sea organs for my Soil Gorget. Having two people doing this is a lot, lot, lot easier and safer compared to just one… Of course, she was the one who dragged me out there in the first place, so… maybe she is to blame too? xD I’m almost done… just need one UFO organ now >.>

#5: [Censored]

Alright… time for the main event… lots and lots of pictures! First up are random pics… I’ll keep the WotG pics at the end so you can avoid them if you don’t want spoilers!

Recent Random Pics

As part of my “twin PLD” series, I’m posting more pics of various Paladins who dress like me… This week: Kazenokizu, who managed a 1:1 mapping for visible equipment!

Next up… big train to zone… i wonder who all those Mamool Ja are after…

Here I am tanking Jailer of Love… Surprisingly simple job on PLD/RDM

Of course, if you poke JoL… right after his friend AV comes along :o

Now for some fun numbers… first, breaking my Blizzard IV record, followed by a crazy number of skillups. This isn’t with the “martial” thingie mog tablet, so I’m curious to see how much better that will be.

That’s it for random pictures…

Next up, WoTG mission cutscenes… Warning: CONTAINS SPOILERS

First up, a Lil’showdown…

Next, a series I call… the faces of Cait Sith =3

And… time for a catfight!

Couple of Dancers in trouble ; ;

And… tarutarus had better watch out… Dancers can Sneak Attack!

I really, REALLY think that the DNC 2-hr should include an animation that does something like this:

And how come Lilisette gets all the cool moves ; ;

And finally… WotG is coming up to the big showdown!

That’s it for this week! Stay tuned next week for hopefully more fun things!

Sooooo.... I'm probably going to be banned soon.

That's right... I'm probably going to be banned soon. For the following reasons:

- Communicating with suspected RMT

- Logging in from suspicious IP addresses

- Not using a "Verified by Visa" credit card

The first two are considered bannable offenses by SE. Teia was banned for responding to /tells from RMT... you know, the ones that you get every other hour offering gil at the low, low price of $36... no... $30, no... $20/million? Even if it was telling them not to bug you, giving them a piece or your mind, it doesn't matter to SE... It's like cutting off the hand that feeds you just because you see that the fingernail is dirty.

Teia was a temp ban... She's back now, but I have only seen her login once since the ban was lifted. Personally, I don't blame her if she decides not to come back.

Wutangwarrior was permanently banned for logging on from what SE calls "suspicious IP addresses". Apparently a set of 4 numbers is now considered illegal by SE's standards. Better watch out and make sure that first number isn't 127! If it is, you are probably suspicious as well and should be banned! I guess SE is assuming that unless you are logging in from one location only, with a router that never reboots, you are not a real customer. I guess what they're saying is that their REAL customers are losers who never leave the house and would never dream of travelling to another location.

Finally... starting at the beginning of this month, SE started adding an extra requirement that the credit card that you use to pay for FFXI must be one that participates in some weird validation program. Now keep in mind that these validation programs do not offer extra protection to the customers, but instead serve to protect the companies. Hence, very few banks have bothered with these services. If your credit card does not work with these programs, you will not be able to use it.

Why am I probably going to be banned?

Let's see... just this evening, I was talking in /tells to a level 7 Galka MNK called Wutangforever. It's a trial account, and everyone knows that only RMT use trial accounts. So... anyone caught talking to them is most likely going to be banned.

Secondly, I'm planning on taking a trip in the near future. Since changing IP addresses is now considered a permanently bannable offense, if I login even once from a hotel network, that means I'll be banned. I was planning on logging in to help out with events, so that means this will be a 2nd strike against my account, meaning that I'll probably not only be banned, but SE will take this as proof and permanently ban me! I mean... their customers could not possibly have any desire to travel, right? Much less have jobs that require them to travel?

Finally, the credit card I've been using to pay for FFXI is expiring in October. I've checked with the programs, and found that it does not work with the validation programs that SE now requires. Hence, going forward, I will not be able to update the CC info with new expiration dates and will no longer be able to pay for FFXI.

How much gil will SE remove by banning Ascule?

To save SE some work for their monthly banning reports, I'll summarize how much gil SE will be removing from FFXI.

Ascule has almost entirely Rare/Ex armor. None of that is sellable, so all SE is doing is removing some junk items from the game. Ascy's primary sellables are:

- Azoth

- Adder Jambiya

- Peacock Charm

In total, approximately worth 5M gil. Let's round that up to 5M including the little gil I actually have.

That's awesome! 5M gil removed from the server. SE can proudly put that on their next report.

At the highest RMT advertised price of $36/mil, that's nearly US$180 that would have gone into my pocket that they prevented me from making!

But wait... $180... my investments fluctuate more than $180 during the day. I could lose, or earn $180 with a single eyeblink and not even notice. I'm actually insulted that they think that I would play this game for money... The amount of time in the game would work out to an hourly wage of $0.05/hour... Would you think that someone with this sort of investment would be involved in RMT activities?

Apparently I would, according to SE.

Conclusion

The Salvage bannings in the beginning of the year gave us one look at how SE thinks. Their current string of bannings gives us a look at what they think of their own customers and fans. Their GM and customer service attitude have given us a glimpse at how little they they think of their customers. Their latest mini-expansions have shown what they think they can pass off as content to their customers. Finally, the quality of their coding and testing show us how little they actually invest in their own product, what they try to get away with selling to their most loyal customers.

So... to put things into perspective... if SE were a car company and you bought their car...

- They'd sell a car where people discovered that you could use biodiesel to drive... and once they find out that their customers are using the cars in this way, they'd confiscate the car

- They'd sell a car in California, and if you drive to Nervada, they'd confiscate your car

- If you talk to anyone selling used cars, they confiscate your car

- If you try to talk to the company, they'll simply say "no comment"

- The manual for the car would consist of a piece of paper, two pencils and a circle. Any attempts to ask the company what it meant would get either no response or "this is all the information we will give you... oh, and if you try to turn the key to start the car, we'll transform all your wheels into cubes"

- They would not only charge you for the car, but things such as the steering wheel, brakes and seats are all optional

- Worse... they'd sell you the car, let you drive it during all summer... then when it comes to winter when you want windshield wipers... they'll sell those to you... individually

- They'd also announce that the windshield wiper sales are a great success. That it rained during the winter had nothing to do with it.

- They'd release a new feature called "Cruise Control" for free to all their current customers. However, it would be stuck at 100Mph with no way of turning it off. They would not be responsible for any speeding tickets that you get.

- They'd also agree to lend you money to buy the car... but after paying off the car in various monthly payments, you'd suddenly have to show them a picture of your pet cat. What? You don't have a cat? Well, too bad... they're taking the car back!

And don't get me started on how augmented weapons are nothing but SE's own "cash for clunkers" program where you take perfectly fine Haubys and throw them away!

So... let's see... SE is planning on releasing this new game called Final Fantasy XIV. I've already described in a previous post how SE is basically recycling everything from XI... not just the concepts, character designs, but even gameplay and developers. They've advertised this themselves. Furthermore, in the same interview, they admit that they are trying to get FFXI players to move over to XIV... for what reason, I have no idea...

It seem to be like... they want to kill FFXI and are doing their best to do so... in the process alienating their own customers... Not only that, they are pretty much guaranteeing that if you move over to XIV, you'll have the same experience you had before.

I don't know about you... but paying money for this sort of service and attitude... seems like willingly throwing money at the classroom bully.

More progress + next-gen MMO news

Whee... more progress in FFXI...

WoTG - Sandy Quests

Big big big thanks to Vanh who caught me when I was bored/down on Friday night. Thanks to him, I'm up-to-date with all the Sandy mission-quests that have been released in WoTG so far. We completely wiped the floor with the "Price of Valor" fight with Vanh kicking butt on SAM, when me helping to finish the job with ultra-fast "SCH-hax" nuking.

The "Bonds that Never Die" mission was a lot of fun. We went as 2x PLD/NIN (and RDM supermule) spamming Atonement going up against a single Young Behemoth. I think this is the first time I've ever really used my Justice Sword effectively since Atonement was the main source of damage. The fight was surprisingly easy in this combination, and we finished with loads of time to spare. I think that the innate defense of PLD to reduce damage taken, plus having a RDM to Dispel made what looked like a hard fight much easier.

WoTG - Windy Quests

On Sunday, Fuuji gathered "those still interested in missions" together to do Windy quests. Fuuji, Vanh(+Ark), Cronus & I went to finish the fight for "The Long March North", a hectic fight against 3 demons and 2 eye-type mobs. We finished the afternoon by farming the items needed for the next quest: a bottled pixie and a testimony, as well as met a... an... an... alien... in the ruins... or something... out of this world o.o;

Annnnnyway... that also finished up all the released Windy quests as of this time. One thing I noticed is that both of these questlines have... a significant incident that occurs at around the same missions. Not going to spoil too much, but... I think that the Windy version was a lot more touching compared to the Sandy version... maybe cos I can't tell the difference between the characters in the Sandy one since they all wear the same outfit x.x; In any case, I'm wondering who will be affected in the Bastok storyline :o

WoTG - Bastok Quests

For the Bastok storyline, I'm currently three quests behind on the "Fire in the Hole" battlefield. I think both Zurar & Tasya are on this quest as well, so we need to find some time to get together and finish this questline. I don't think anyone else is doing Bastok... if you're out there, put something in the comments or let me know so we can coordinate!

WoTG - Continuing on

Fun part about getting past the quests is that I can finally progress in the main WoTG storyline... which currently consists of running around with Lilisette and Portia! I'll probably put some pics up later this week of us 3 dancers running around in 3 different outfits xD The minigames are amusing, but... also frustrating to do... at least the cutscenes are pretty funny. Took about an hour to finish the minigames, most of which was spent sneaking around the glacier x.x

Currently stopped on Mission 19: Betrayal at Beaucedine. This is another big fight, one that is done in the open so other people can help. Hopefully we'll be doing this next Sunday. After this fight, there is one more annoying quest, then two more instanced fights before we have to wait until the next update again.

Other FFXI stuffs

Let's see... other FFXI stuffs that happened this weekend included:

* Getting Valor Coronet -1, the ONLY drop in Saturday's Dynamis Valkrum o.o;

- Just a little amused that I actually got it... seems like other people are passing up the -1 pieces because they want to be able to store their relic sets? I have no intention of storing any of my sets... I use all 4 jobs weekly in different events...

- Another side note: I now have the +1 relic hats for all 4 of my jobs xD

- Hoping for more -1 drops for the other pieces... especially Dancer... and I'm also hoping to eventually finish the SCH and PLD relic sets... 3/6 for SCH, 2/6 for PLD at the moment xD

* Tanking Alexander (TOAU44)

- Sunday afternoon, Tassy asked me to come help her for the final TOAU fight :o

- I still remember the pain of this mission when I did it... back then, I only had BLU leveled, so I was relegated to the backup/helper healer... I don't remember how many times we attempted it, but it had me as frustrated as when I did the CoP airship fight, or for my BLU final limit break fight x.x

- This time, I was PLD/RDM and we won it easily with over 10 minutes left. I don't think we did anything that significantly differently compared to when I was doing it... except maybe that PLD/RDM made for an incredible tank for holding hate

- Simply using my Dynamis experience, I was able to hold hate even though the nuking phase for the Blue Mage by simply spamming Dispel/Blind/Flash. I know the theory behind PLD/RDM hate holding, but seeing it in action still surprises me xD

- Had one wipe against Alexander right after he 2-hr'ed and we were out of MP... Tractor, Reraise and finished the fight with I think maybe 1 person using 2-hrs :o

* Dancer /check

- So... I've been /checking every Dancer I see to see if they have some gear that I may have missed in my search for gear... After all, that's how I discovered the existence of the Scouter's Rope

- This weekend, I found one piece of gear that another Dancer had that I didn't know about... the Elusive Earring has +5 evasion, which is 1 more compared to the Velocity Earring I currently use. Intrigued by this, I went looking for more evasion pieces and was reminded of the Novia Earring (Evasion +7, Enmity -7) which is dropped by Jailer of Love x.x Rooks did tell me that I should consider getting some sea stuff when I first started coming to help out... I guess I found an item that I really want now ^^; Not sure that the Love Torque is any good for DNC, and I already got a Justice Sword... so... guess this is up on the list ^^;

- Also ran across one DNC that was... fulltime in AF with nothing but +chr equipment in all slots... really... while meleeing :o

Other MMO News - FFXIV

Looks like Gamescon in Europe has brought out some new media for some next-gen MMOs. First up, I'm sure most of you have seen this, but here's a link to some FFXIV footage, including gameplay and showing off of their graphics engines and lots of emotes

http://kotaku.com/5341417/final-fantasy-xiv-clip-smorgasbord

So far, not too impressed on XIV... looks like they're still being lazy, taking the XI concepts, races and basic gameplay, putting a WoW interface around it and updating the graphics for modern hardware. Quests seemed to be the usual "bring me X items that drop from Y mobs". In fact... in an interview with one of the XIV developers had this little tidbit:

Q: Why does FFXIV look so similar to XI?

Tanaka: (Laughs) I think it's simply because the same people are making the game.

Mmm... same people, same basic character designs (different names), updated graphics engine... I guess they're being eco-friendly? Recycle & reuse? I mean, I'm sure we'll see Chocobos, Moogles, Cid all over XIV... that's part of the fun of the Final Fantasy games... but... does this mean we'll have all of the same problems? Same gameplay?

Oh, here's another fun tidbit from the interview:

Tanaka: The main thing we learned from FFXI was that once we launched the game, we communicated with our players to receive feedback and improve the game and improve the game experience. So we really believe that communication with our players is the most important thing, and that is something we would like to continue for FFXIV as well.

So... they claim to believe that communicating with players is important... does anyone buy that? I believe there's an old saying "actions speak louder than words". I guess they *did* improve the game after enough people whined... but how long did that take? Actually... can any old timers say... how long does it take for SE to take feedback from their "customers" and actually implement it? Are we talking multiple years? Maybe someone should ask if they intend to have a customer-service division... or hire any QA staff!

Other MMO News - Star Wars: The Old Republic

A series of videos came out this weekend regarding the upcoming Star Wars MMO: http://kotaku.com/5343638/the-old-republic-20-minute-developer-walkthrough

Interesting gameplay mechanics... especially the Smuggler class with the cover system. Bioware is definitely using many tricks from various games, including their own games to make this an interesting looking MMO. I really like how they did the cutscenes... fully voiced over, with the Mass Effect-type dialog choices. That your choices will actually affect the game would be a nice change from FFXI's current method where your choices basically mean either nothing at all, or that the wrong choice would mean you have to try again ~.~ Having other players in the cutscenes also has a huge potential. In other MMOs, it seems more like... well, you're playing a single-player game story-wise, and you have to get these other NPCs to tag along... except they're not NPCs... but you never interact with them inside the story/cutscenes. I mean... *I* was the one that saved the world from Promathia! The rest of you just happened to be there to cheer me on!

I never played Knights of the Old Republic, but I did play Mass Effect... that was one of the few RPGs that actually kept me interested till the very end in both story and gameplay! Hence, I have high hopes for this game. Only the Final Fantasy series, and the Xenosaga series were able to do that. Almost all other RPGs I've played, I've lost interest in the middle x.x

I just hope they can live up to their "epic hero" goal. It seems that every MMO out there starts off with an awesome intro cinematic, then they drop you off in the middle of town with an onion sword and tell you to go poke some rabbits outside of town (and have those rabbits kick your butt).

So what next?

The fun part about having goals is working towards them... Now the funny part about the goals that I set for myself a mere two weeks ago if that I've already finished half of them. Two of the goals was to finish off my homam set and DNC relic. Lucked out on the very next time an opportunity for them to drop came along.

So now... my original goal list is down to

- Finish WotG

- Get PLD AF+1 feet

The later isn't even something I really want to finish... more of a "since I'm helping in Limbus anyway, may as well get it if the opportunity comes along". Finishing WotG is again, something purely dependent on SE's schedule. Thanks to Fuuji who is doing some legwork in organizing people, we may actually have critical mass in order to progress further in the WotG missions since the last update!

Funny thing is... ever since I finished my DNC relic, I've been feeling pretty complete about FFXI. I don't have any urges to go out to do events to get shinies for myself anymore, even for my other jobs. Still, most events are fun for me still, so I'll keep going... and some events I'm intentionally going out to make enjoyable for me (Main assist in Dynamis, tanking Dyna... who knows... I wonder if Rooks will let a DNC pull... coming DNC to every Limbus where it's practical)

So... now I'm kinda sitting back and wondering what next? I think I'm practically done with FFXI... well, except for coming to events to help others as well as have some fun... the most I can think of us maybe accumulating gil to maybe get a Roundel Earring at some point in the future, and possibly finish off my HP merits

Fashion show!

So… here’s a little fashion show :) I’m only putting up full sets… so… one set in particular is not yet complete. I never picked up the Cobra Unit Harness, so I don’t have a pic of that

First up, SCH & PLD stuffs!

Here we have the actual SCH AF… the SCH AF with relic body and hat, PLD AF and the Iron Ram set from Sandy [S]. While the SCH relic set is not complete, it does match well with the AF set so I included it xD The SCH relic body has a small dat mod to change the skirt from the dull brown color to a much nicer red :D There’s another dat mod in there that I’m not saying!

Now for some swimsuits… I screwed up the 2nd pic slightly xD

In keeping with the theme… we have some festival outfits!

Full x-mas gear… Mumor’s Sunbreeze Festival outfit (complete with heart rod) and the latest yukata!

Can’t forget the base AF for my first two jobs… another couple of dat mods on my DNC AF, including Lilisette’s hairpin xD Now… does anyone know what the armor set on the right is? I really doubt anyone else has this full set xD

And to finish off the fashion show… Dancer relic!

I really don’t like the way the Azoth looks so I replaced it’s dat file with another Jambiya… so now I actually look like I have matching daggers!

And… bonus pic from Sunday’s Einherjar xD

That’s it for pics from last week!

Dancer - Complete!

Tada! 6/6 on Dancer Relic! At long last I finally get my new tights from Dynamis-Tavnasia of all places xD Big big big big big thanks to everyone at BMO, especially Hyouga who passed the tights so that I could have them. This is the one piece of relic that I wear basically full time, while all other pieces are macroed in and out as necessary. I've been hoping for these since the very beginning... kinda funny how they are the last I actually got! This is also my 2nd full relic set since I started with BMO late last year, and the one I really, really, really wanted to complete!

At this point, I think my Dancer job is reasonably complete. I'll be picking up a Tiphia Sting later tonight to finish off the gear that I can reasonably obtain. I've always figured I'd get one, but I've been forgetting about it xD With the tights, I'm very definitely a happy Dancer and will probably be coming DNC much more to things again ^^;

Next for Dancer:

- Finish HP merits (5/8 now)

- Maybe finish Dex merits (1/8... and these are painful merits)

- Maybe a Soil Gorget (I do WS quite a bit on DNC... Tasya finally convinced me that I should go get one)

- Gilfarm... yes, gilfarm.

So, the really silly bit about Dancer equipment is that two of the best pieces of gear are simply not obtainable on Hades. These are the Roundel Earring, and the Airy Buckler, both of which are campaign ops drops from the beastmen strongholds. Given that Hades generally sucks when it comes to big team efforts like this, I really doubt we'll ever be given a chance to assault the beastmen strongholds, so every single Roundel Earring on the server must have come from a server transfer. We've never actually seen a single Airy Buckler on the AH on Hades.

So... as long as people keep importing the Roundel Earring, I might have a chance of buying one sometime in the future. Of course, this means I'll have to gilfarm... 4-5M gil... so... mmm... that's about 500 Ancient Beastcoins... Hope nobody else in Limbus wants those ^^; Otherwise, I'm going to have to find some other source of gil... like ISNMs, or ENMs... I'm currently basically broke after buying my Adder Jambiya ^^;

Buuuuuuuuut... then again I consider the Roundel Earring as part of the "unreasonable" set of gear, hard to get, or highly expensive, similar to Joytoy, Ermine's Tail or Salvage armor due to the pain involved. Fortunately, gil farming is a lot LESS painful than going to try the stupid MMM maze time after time, and is something that other people generally do, so hopefully I'll be able to get enough gil with time :)

Other news: I'm half considering putting up more pics of various outfits similar to the BLU pics below... anyone interested in seeing a fashion show?

BLU Fashion Show!

First up, big THANK YOU to Rooks, Dade, Rizon, and Weaponx for helping me get my last BLU spell: Asuran Claws… While this isn’t one of the critical spells a BLU needs, it is a very nice feeling to be completely done with all BLU spells (at least until the next big update).

Furthermore, on Saturday’s Limbus I lucked out with the drop and actually got my last Homam piece from Omega… It’s been 1 1/2 years since I started doing Limbus, Back then I was a newly leveled BLU, not even 75 on my first job yet, and the roster was significantly different. Vanh & Fuuji are the only other two left from that period who are still with us.

We’re definitely at a point where we can continue to pull off Omega consistently if membership remains as it is… I’m hoping it does, since Toku & I had set up the point system such that people would still have incentive to stay even after completing homam since Ancient Beastcoins are a decent source of gil and items.

Anyway, on with the fashion show! First up… all my BLU outfits. I think at this point my Blue Mage is complete… I can’t think of any other outfits that would significantly impact my performance. (click for bigger image)

Ok, now time for some other fun pics from the past few weeks~

A long time ago in an early Dynamis Jeuno, I successfully took an Eagle Eye Shot straight to the head on Dancer by pulling hate for the split second it took for the mob to do the move… Of course, since I go to Dynamis as DNC/SAM…
Now on PLD:

 

Here’s an example of Ebullience at work… or as Vanh/Fuuji call it, SCH hax!

Later that same run… overconfident BLMs? xD

This is the reason why I like to come as SCH for the AMK final fight… need to bring SAMs next time. 5 Henchmen pop, but before I could get off the Aspir, Zurar had killed one with a self-darkness SC for almost 10k

Seems like PLDs everywhere dress pretty similarly xD Iron Ram body looks pretty similar to hydra body :)

Here’s Teia with a completely inappropriate dying position ~.~

And here’s Altima who somehow managed to fall under the ice… silly DRK

I’m still amused that I can put together Mumor’s entire outfit xD I can look like an NPC!

The new yukatas look really light compared to the old ones… here’s the new & old side by side

That’s it for now!

Dancer equipment

Recently discovered this site: http://ffxigear.com

Fun little site to easily play with equipment, and more importantly, show various gear sets. I thought it would be fun to put up the various gear sets I use on DNC and see if anyone had any suggestions on how to improve them.

I'm not sure how many people realize this, but Dancer is really the main job that I go out of my way to equip. While I generally do my best on my other jobs, I don't go out of my way to gear them up as crazily as I do DNC. I have two million+ daggers, a 2M+ necklace, and lots of expensive situational gear on DNC such as a Scouter's Rope and Delta Earring. I don't think any of my other jobs has a single piece worth anywhere near 1M xD

Anyway, here are some gear sets and their uses:

Haste set - http://ffxigear.com/?ref=18309

- As much haste as I can pile on... I'm still desperately needing Etoile Tights to complete this set. This is what I typically use for most party situations. Sometimes I'll put on Enkidu's Mittens instead of Dusk Gloves when we are moving a lot in order to move faster. I could squeeze another 1% haste with a Walmart Turban, but I figured that the Denali Bonnet had other benefits, and looks a lot better xD

Accuracy set - http://ffxigear.com/?ref=18680

- Surprisingly, this is a gear set that I rarely use. My accuracy is generally good enough with my haste gear that I almost never need to switch to full accuracy. I can also simply eat some sushi if I need accuracy. About the only time I've used this is during Dynamis-Buburimu when we attack the birds. They are surprisingly evasive. However, these days I'm rarely on DNC when I go to Dynamis since I'm enjoying PLD a lot more there xD. I know I can improve this by picking up a Sniper's Ring, but I don't think the extra gil and inventory-1 is worth 1 more accuracy.

WS set - http://ffxigear.com/?ref=18681

- I've been using this more often these days as I get comfortable with managing TP as well as trusting my backup healer to cover for me. I no longer sit on 200+ TP, and typically bounce between 70-150% TP depending on how much I have to heal while WSing every chance I get. I also use 3 macros for WSing... one to put on the above gear, one to actually do the WS, and one to switch back out to my regular gear. Currently, I can do about 650+ with both Dancing Edge and Pyrrhic Kleos, and as high as 1100+ for a Dancing Edge if I have just activated Saber Dance

Evasion set - http://ffxigear.com/?ref=18531

- Mainly for soloing, or survival... maximizes evasion at the expense of everything else. It's amusing to see how often things that would demolish other jobs miss me xD

Enmity set - http://ffxigear.com/?ref=18530

- Just for the crazy occasion when I want to tank... happens most often in duo or small-party situations. I think this is the most enmity I can put on so far. The two expansion pieces have +4 & +5 enmity as augments. Fan Dance would further increase enmity by another +15

You'll notice that this is all equipment for DNC/NIN. I often go DNC/SAM for things since Meditate gives me more flexibility to spam cures or WS, plus the TP gain rate for DNC/SAM is overall faster compared to /NIN at the sacrifice of some survivability. The only equipment changes I have for /SAM are to replace the Suppanomimi with a Delta Earring for the extra +chr, +dex and -enmity. Oh, and using a Legion Scutum for the -enmity and extra defense.

So, can anyone think of gear that I may have missed for DNC? I didn't know about the Scouter's Rope until I /checked a random DNC who was doing a good evasive tanking job in campaign. Is there other gear I may have missed?

Fey Weapons

Fuuji & Hyouga /poked me a couple of nights ago and told me that I should look into the new "Fey Weapons" that were added in the last update. These are job-specific weapons that can be augmented by completing the Succor to the Sidhe quest. Teia has been wanting to augment her lance for a while now, and Fuuji & Hyouga went out to get some weapons with some decent augments.

Personally, I was going to look into doing this quest once I had more gil (still need to pay Vanh back his loan!) and once the price of the Ogre Jambiya became more reasonable. This dagger was selling on the AH for around 200k, which I thought was much too high. Hyouga was the one that pointed out that the AH was completely overpriced, and that the materials only cost about 25-30k ~.~ Stupid AH price gougers! The AH price is coming down quickly, but I was able to get in touch with Greysnake, one of Hyouga and my mutual friends to craft one for me! I met Grey in the beginning of this year when I was leveling SCH. He was leveling RDM at the time and we had quite a few good parties together :)

Well, now I have a DNC weapon and I'm ready to try for some augments. It's going to be tough for an augment Ogre Jambiya to compete with my two current daggers, the Azoth(accuracy + evasion) and the Adder Jambiya(evasion + impairs evasion). Looking at the augments that have been found so far, I'd have to get both Double Attack and Store TP before I'd consider keeping the Ogre Jambiya and not trying for a better augment.

Just need to find a time, and the people to do this quest now :)

Just call me Dfioptgawri

The races and job classes for FFXIV have been revealed:

http://kotaku.com/5330299/final-fantasy-xiv-jobs-races-revealed

With race names like "Miqo'te" and "Roegadyn", I think everyone should have a keyboard-smash name in order to fit in with the game lore... I mean, I'm sure RMT will be picking names such as "John" or "Lisa" that do not fit in with the lore of a world sounds like a h-game "Ero-zea"

How would you pronounce these names anyway? xD

I think I've figured out SE's naming scheme... smash keyboard, throw in vowels, add in a ' randomly if they feel like... Let's call the starting city Erjio'pasod

Oh ya... apparently one of the "jobs" that you can do is called "Gatherer", so... fetch quests galore? xD

Ratcheting down FFXI

Last week was a busy one for missions... besides finishing the two mini-expansions a few times, I also did some work on the WotG missions. Currently, I'm at the following stages for the WotG missions:

- Bastok Quest 7: Fire in the Hole

- Sandy Quest 8: The Price of Valor

- Windy Quest 8: The Long March North

This is about 2/3 of the way through all of the current WotG missions/quests. Need to find some people to go do the rest of the missions with me. The quests where I've stopped are all places which require a party to fight. Not necessarily a full party, but they are not solo-able. I'm far enough along all the quest lines that I can probably help almost anyone catch up.

With FFXIV announced, frustrations with SE's attitude towards FFXI (covered many times in the past), and completing the little content that remains in FFXI, it seems to me that my time in FFXI will be coming to an end soon. Of course, SE seems to be speeding the process along with the complete lack of customer service and going out of their way to ban paying customers. I'm a very goal-oriented person, so I figured that I'd look at my current goals in FFXI and see what I want to continue to pursue, and which goals I'm going to give up on before the end.

Current personal goals (as of August'09)

- Finish the WotG storyline

- Complete DNC relic set (5/6 now, need Etoile Tights from glacier/tav)

- Complete Homam set (4/5 - Need body)

- Get PLD AF+1 feet (Need Temenos item)

Pretty short list.. of course, the first goal is at the mercy of SE's timetable, and the other two goals are completely at the mercy of what I'm calling "SE randomness". There's a high chance that I won't finish any of these goals since the CC I'm using to play FFXI expires in October, and it doesn't support their new "verified" BS. I'll have to change CC numbers to continue to play, and that's generally considered a bannable offense these days. I doubt SE will be releasing any more real expansions, and I'm hoping that they finish the WotG expansion sometime this decade.

This goal list has shrunk a lot. If I can finish the above goals, I think I'd be satisfied in calling FFXI a "completed" game. Some of my goals have been accomplished (Enkidu harness, finishing ToAU, CoP missions, etc.), while the following goals are being dropped:

Dropped Goals

- Ermine's Tail -- I think MMM is one of the biggest failures in the game. Either I'm getting the map wrong (possible), or the drop rate is just plain stupid. In either case, I've picked up an Adder Jambiya which might actually be better considering that it not only has evasion, but also has the added effect of reducing a mob's evasion and doesn't have Beast Affinity so I won't be intimidated when fighting birds -.-

- Nyzul Armor -- There was a time when I had a hope that we could get 15/15 armor for everyone in the group. Now, after months of doing Nyzul, I'm ready to quit. We've gotten full sets for Ghiren, Zurar, Karou (all Askar), Kuraikaze (Goliard), and me (Denali). I'm really close to finishing Goliard too, lacking just the body, and still missing 3 Askar pieces, but at this point, I'm more than happy to walk away from this event. I only wanted the missing pieces for completion, but I don't really need them. Closing out Nyzul would mean that Karou could go do more climbing, Zurar could go get Captain rank, and anyone who wanted to could farm Assault Points for either items, or Salvage. At this point, I just really want to get Spengler a couple of pieces for helping us out for the past few weeks.

- Joyeuse -- After spending a couple of hours trying to help Vanh with this last Friday, I realized that there is no way that I'm going to spend hours sitting around waiting to fight a placeholder every 16 minutes for a little sword. I have better things to do... for example, watch grass grow. Having any sort of competition does not help either as I hate going against someone else. This would mean someone would go away disappointed, either me, or the other person. Instead, I'm sticking with the Adder Jambiya for DNC, and my new Justice Sword for PLD. Oh, and if I don't get a Joytoy, that means I don't have to bother meriting sword since I won't be using it on DNC :P

- Roundel Earring -- The funny part about the Roundel Earring is that it is a rare drop from a BCNM that can only be accessed when Windy owns Castle Oztroja [S] in campaign. Given how much Hades sucks in terms of campaign, we've never actually owned this zone, meaning that every single Roundel Earring on Hades was transferred from another server. That said, the only way to get this would be to pay the 4-5M price in gil. Given that I've never had more than 2M gil before, and typically struggle to even get to 1M, it's highly unlikely that I'd get this unless I get super-lucky in multiple BCNM or ISNM chests.

Plus... well... it wouldn't fit in my macro lines given that I already swap 2 items for every waltz >.>

- Nation Rank 10 -- I think everyone in AP has either finished all 3 nation's storylines, or have at least finished one. I'm stuck at 7-1 right now... or is it 8-1? I don't remember. In any case, the Bastok storyline isn't interesting enough for me to continue with it... Not going to bother wasting time trying to gather people for this, even if there is a gil reward at the end -.- I've seen the full Windy storyline before, and I'm not that interested in the Sandy one, so I'm not planning on changing nations either!

- Asuran Claws -- This is a really silly one... when this spell first came out, the DNC AF pieces were released at the same time. When most Blue Mages were out getting together forming alliances to get the spell, I was out farming materials to complete my new DNC AF xD Of course, this meant that by the time I was done, all the spell-hunting parties were done and I had nobody to go hunt the spell with! The problem with this spell is that only the level 85+ gnoles do it, AND you need to give it spike hate in order for it to stand up and use the move. This means at the very least, a well equipped party with lots of high DDs or a PLD/WAR tank. These mobs hit hard, hit fast and have an evil regen move, so in order to even attempt to get the spell would require pulling in a lot of people. My only hope for this would be if one of the WotG missions requires that we fight a Gnole that does it. That was how I learnt Body Slam xD

Besides Nyzul, I'm already ratcheting back my involvement for the following activities

- Einherjar -- I actually no longer need anything from this activity... Picked up all the items I can get with the Ichor... no real interest in the abjuration gear... I only show up because it's actually *fun* to do, especially when we pull off a near-loss with a lot of epic tactics. Still... given how annoying the time is for this, I'll probably only show up when convenient and hope I get the right feathers to do Odin

- ZNMs - I've already cut down on involvement as in I'm not contributing as much zeni as before. As the 2nd highest zeni contributor, I think I can let others pick up some of the slack. I still have enough stockpiled that I can pick up a few pops here and there in case we need an emergency pop, but there are many people in ZeniBailout who need to start pulling their weight!

So... main activities I'm still doing at 100% (other than missions) are...

- Dynamis -- Fun for me on PLD, or as main assist on DNC. SCH is amusing for nuking, but not as fun compare to PLD or DNC

- Limbus -- Still need Homam armor, PLD AF+1 item, and this is my main gil source

Both events are on Wednesday and Saturday, which is nice as I could easily skip out the rest of the week :)

So... that's the plan until the next big MMO release comes along to distract me...