Final Fantasy XI Then...

[Tsingtao]

Tobal you there mate?

[C']

I may as well post it here so everyone knows and maybe have a laugh at my expense.

Some of you may know that the last 3 weeks I have been working on getting my Hakutaku eyes. I got the King Ranperre's Tomb one months ago, then a few weeks back I got lucky in Sea Serpent Grotto and got both of the eyes to drop there first kill. I bought the Den of Rancor eye and me and Apathye worked our butt's off in Ifrit's Cauldron in an extremely dangerous area to get the last one I needed but yesterday our persistance paid off.

So I had 5 eyes and needed them crafting and Bayan told me the name of the crafter he knew for it. I spoke with the person in question and heagreed to perform the synth so I went out to see him. Handed him the synth ingredients and was so nervous that I couldn't watch the screen but I could see Moot who was watching. When I saw the look that appeared on his face I knew my fears had been realised.

I checked the chatlog and there it was. The synth had failed! Sadly a failure synthing the Hakutaku Eye Cluster always results in a critical fail and the loss of all ingredients so I am now back at the beginning and considering what to do. I'm at as a low a point as I possibly can be and I don't know if I can be bothered to carry on. I spent 2 hours fighting the weaker eyes in Sea Serpent Grotto last night but got no drop.

I don't know what to do

[talizker]

I don't know what to do

aw man, thats harsh. All I can say is if you need any help getting the items again just let me know - Ninja is at Lv20 and i'm out of Valkurm so I basically have nothing planned until we do COP/Zilart.

[Tobal]

Get farming again, If you need help getting your eyes just ask as you and wedge helped with mine. Still you achieved all the eye?s in a time quicker than I did (think I took 1-2months) plus you always have the option of farming for money to buy the harder eye pieces, it might be quicker for you to do 1-2hrs farming your oils and buying than farming eye?s in a dangerous area for 1-2 hrs. At least your dirty manu won!

I was certainly crapping myself while my eyes where being crafted, horrible wait wondering if a lot of hard work is going to go down the drain in 3 secs, let alone the fight to come.


Good weekend for me, Saturday I started the Venerer ring quest at first with apa but he quickly faded :P, so I went on for was pretty much all of Saturday(which a couple of divisions for Moot) travelling back all over the world, I also managed to sell my current ven ring while I was doing the quest for 250k, which was nice, also in the many trips to norg that day I finished of the Yhoatar teleport quest and sold that for 180k. I also sold back my Hombami after poor showing during moot eldmine coffer hunt.

Sunday brought 2enm?s which didn?t go super smoothly as we had number MR fakes, still it paid off with Mea giving us the elemental drop which is worth 6m, and the ?the big one? we got the mannequin feet.

[Tobal]

Anyone up for the Bowyer Ring quest, so far just wedge and I, will need 6 people. I think there may be a previous quest to do before we can start this but I can?t check AK right now, but what the quest involves is abit of travelling talking to Npc, farming of Ahrimen Tears(sp?) which we could buy and a Bcnm in Newton?s Mineshaft a lvl40cap 6man, vs 4-5 goblins. The trick is you only have to beat one goblin but other goblins are whm/rdm curing the one you have to beat and casting sleep, so It?s a task of 2hr the boss to death and grinding out the victory.

Ring will be worth it is lvl.29 +3acc, +3rng acc, perfect for ENM30?s and if you don?t want it a 300k sale awaits!

[talizker]

Anyone up for the Bowyer Ring quest, so far just wedge and I, will need 6 people. I think there may be a previous quest to do before we can start this but I can?t check AK right now, but what the quest involves is abit of travelling talking to Npc, farming of Ahrimen Tears(sp?) which we could buy and a Bcnm in Newton?s Mineshaft a lvl40cap 6man, vs 4-5 goblins. The trick is you only have to beat one goblin but other goblins are whm/rdm curing the one you have to beat and casting sleep, so It?s a task of 2hr the boss to death and grinding out the victory.

Ring will be worth it is lvl.29 +3acc, +3rng acc, perfect for ENM30?s and if you don?t want it a 300k sale awaits!

That sounds fun! If its a Tal friendly time then i'll be up for that ^^

[mikewl]

That is some real bad luck Rare.

I would suggest focusing on something else for awhile as if you go straight back to getting the drops again you could just get fed up real easy, maybe we should just work on missions for awhile, the more entertaining stuff.

I am going to be away from the game over the next few weeks, just coming on for certain things, maybe a break from leveling and farming could be what you need as well right now.

[Tsingtao]

Rare that is awful luck, but as with the others I'll help in anyway I can if you want to go after the eyes. Otherwise I think the clusters are 1.2 million at the moment to avoid all the danger of breaks etc.

Well the weekend for me went well, dinged 65 on PLD after some serious grind and then got a nice buffer in the 2 ENMs on the Sunday. Another plus ws the big one, doing that plus soloing a few EP mobs has now got my WAR to 34 so I'm good now to 69 on my sub.

It was also a drop weekend for me picking up both my Jelly Ring and the Elemental Earring dropping in the promyvion. Given my new found wealth I invested in a dark spirit pact leaving me just my light spirit to get to have a full set of elemental pacts on SMN.

So what now? Given Talizker has now got NIN to 20 and with Darwock back I think it's mission time. Here's what I'd like to do, see what you guys think:

CoP 2-5 Riverne Site A#01 - Go get our wyvern scales one night this week in preperation to do a BCNM run next week. We could maybe go straight to it after we get our scales if the drop quickly but to be honest I'd rather do the BC when we have at least 3 hours to use so if we lose we can wait for 2 hour reheats and try again.
On this one I think we have: Tsingtao, Hicory, Talizker, Darwock, Wedgemoon, and Tobal. Time to start drawing up our strategy!

ZM4 - Following earlier farming all we need for this now is 4 unlit lanterns, I would suggest a farming trip into the Temple after we get through the CoP mission. As far as I see it we have Mosley (WHM), Tsintao (PLD), Dartwock (BLM), Talizker (RDM), Rarehero (NIN), Kerushi (WAR). Strategy on this one really isn't clear but any extra levels we can get before we go in will help us out. My hope is to be 67 for this one and hopefully able to tank effectively against Rare's damage output.

After these we're looking at running the ZMs all the way to sky and getting the next mission done in CoP (another 40 cap) before we get ourselves organised for the 50 cap missions. In the interim my other aim is to get my Moongate pass and some more BCNM 20 fun, Miloco has also asked to come with us next time so should be 5 heading along.

[mikewl]

Last night was annoying, again though its because I forgot to use a reraise II item.

Leveling in Attowa Chasm, doing good until agro, lost half the experience points I had gained.

Bayan did ask if I wanted to join in the Hakutaku eye farming, usually I would have but I just wanted to leave the game and chill out.

Did you manage to get any drops.

[C']

Well feeling a hundred times better about the game than I did 24 hours ago. Many thanks to Apathye and Bayan for encouraging me to come online and get back to work on a new Hakutaku Cluster. Also to Truehero and Tsingtao for joining in.

I?ve managed to get 3 of the eyes back which is fantastic work for 1 evening. The 2 eyes from Sea Serpent Grotto were more stingy than my last attempt with the Mindgazers being especially troublesome (thankfully Bayan went to the trouble of getting a Sahagin key so we could get behind the Ornamental Door for more spawns).

The King Ranperre?s Tomb one was much easier dropping on the second kill leaving me just Ifrit?s Cauldron to farm and Den of Rancor to buy.

[Tsingtao]

That's great to hear rare, was hpoing you'd get number 3 last night. If you want my help in Ifrits Cauldron I'm happy to come along, I could use a coffer key up there anyway. Drop a post if you plan to head up and I'll grab my gear and come and help out. I quite enjoyed the camping last night, all these drops being needed is really help my staff skill! Picked up 4 levels last night to reach 144 skill, current cap is 226 I think.

Why buy the Den one, can we not go farm in there for it, we can get our unlit lantern drops while we're at it ready for ZM4. Got a real urge to get into that BCNM sooner than later now, think it's offical though you'll be tanking last night proved I can't hold hate from you.

[C']

If people want to help with Ifrit?s Cauldron then that will be great. Obviously our farming sessions over the weekend have proven that me and Apathye can do it as a duo but extra people will make it smoother (in theory). I need to warn people though that farming the eyes in Ifrit?s Cauldron is a much harder prospect than Sea Serpent Grotto and King Ranperre?s Tomb.

We found 2 areas where Dodomeki (the hecteye mob) spawn. A safe area where 2 spawn (only potential trouble is a lone bomb that conned as Decent Challenge to me) and a harder area which is a room containing 4 Dodomeki spawns. Considering the respawn timer and sucky droprate the room with 4 is preferable camp but it is filled with Decent Challenge bombs and 2 Sulfur Scorpions (which checked to me at 69 as Very Tough but Decent Challenge to Apathye so I think they are 71-72 range). We had to be very careful when we were fighting as the bombs aggro to white and black magic (but luckily not songs or Ninjutsu) plus the bombs and scorpions seem to roam the entire room instead of being restricted to a certain route. Aggro is an ongoing concern and we found ourselves constantly using Sneak and Invisible to move around to a different camp based on the mob movements.

So if people are up to the challenge, come along

When we will be going is uncertain as it really is dependent on Apathye being able to help as he has Silence (vital for the eyes) and Stun (to deal with any Ga spells and Self-Destruct should we be forced to fight some bombs).

We did get a coffer key to drop off of a Dodomeki at the weekend and I saw a coffer spawn in the harder room when I tried soloing on Saturday so the good news is if you were to come Tsing there is a possibility of getting you a map. Also I got Bomb Queen Ash too which Apathye told me is used to spawn Bomb Queen who has a ring drop that is useful for end game tanking.

As for why I don?t farm the Den of Rancor eye, well from what I gather the mobs are 72-74 and therefore even harder than the Mindgazers. Getting to them is also awkward as the Den of Rancor is a difficult zone and the hecteyes spawn near to where Hakutaku is spawned. Very, very difficult to do.

Also whilst I obviously don?t mind tanking ZM4, last night may not be the best thing to judge if you can tank my damage or not. Remember you were using an underleveled staff so your damage was lower than if you used Sword/Shield and also I was borrowing Bayan?s Haubergeon which raised my DD abilities immensely. Using Assault Jerkin or Scorpion Harness, I am likely to be weaker.

[Tsingtao]

Fair enough on the Den, I just wondered as it is my plan for our next lantern farming party to go to the Den to get our drops. As far as I can tell practically all th Tonberries in there drop them and I thought we might be able to combine both jobs into one venture.

Would like to farm our wyvern scales up either tonight or tomorrow night as well so we're all set for the next CoP mission next week.

[Tobal]

All tonberries drop a 'lantern' but what you need is an 'Unlit Lantern' which can only be found in the temple on certain mobs, and as Bayan has said before he's got a sure fire way to get them from the Blm types found onthe Temples outside bits.

[Tsingtao]

Ah I hadn't heard that, if there's a sure fire way to get the unlit lanterns that would be ace. Have to have a word with Mr B later to sort out what it is and get them farmed up. I had heard they dropped in the Den as well from specific tonberries but I'll take them anywhere we can find them.