Final Fantasy XI Then...

[talizker]

The clusters are far from mandatory, I reckon half of what we buy we'll sell agian but if we've got it then we're good just in case. As always I'm working on over prepared being good, things can always be sold again but theres no AH in the Cauldron!

After this one we're just a few evening away from Sky, may see if we can fit ZM6 and ZM8 into one night ^^

I certainly hope to sell some stuff back as I am down to the smallest amount of gil i've had since pretty much day 1 (5k).

"a few evenings away from sky..." Sweet (even though I have no real idea what it is!)

[Tsingtao]

Well I'm also as screwed for gil as your good self so a BCNM 20 would be very good for me. Also we could look at if theres anything good we could go farm now, I think now we have enough players over 60 Simurgh and Roc maybe killable to us and both have some real high value drops. I have an urge to kill an HNM, Serket is safe these days as well with the mob behaviour cacking.

The BCNM 20 is our best route to instant cash though I think, I'm surviving almost purely on drops whilst xping and gardening right now.

[vwilsonuk]

Ninja is about 1500k xp away from level 10, still happy to go with BLM sub mind whatever you prefer as I'm not used to using NIN sub. Just a case of finding a suitable evening. Am starting to relinquish hope of ever getting more than 30 free minutes again for the rest of my life the way the last few weeks have been, but if someone can find some for me pls do let me know.

[talizker]

I'm certainly not going to complain about the lack of gil but it is of course a result of limiting play to "fun" activities as I am at present.

What this means is that i'm definately up for fun ways to make gil so any bcnm's, hnm's etc are all good with me.

Hic, Tsing, have you got a free evening between Wednesday and New Year we could allocated for a bcnm20 run or are you away the whole time?

Hic, the only reason for the Nin 10 sub is so you can dual weild some nice low delay daggers (with en-thunder) so no fancy job related tactics requied. Saying that we totally owned the mobs last time so maybe it will be doable with RDM/anything!

[Tobal]

if your short on people for these bcnm20's i'll come i need to make some money, as the bcnm60 seem dead in the water.

Actually anyone up for a BCNM30 vs 2 beetles,

http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/db/quests.html?fquest=407

i can come as pld/blm/drk/mnk/sam/war, im mainly interested it getting a wyvern earring, rest of the drop seem good enough, heck is anyone up for just 1 or 2 cracks at it if use my own seal and pay for your med's

[vwilsonuk]

Wednesday = ZM5 (Tsingtao)
Thursday = proposed night out with RL friends (RL? we so crazy!)
Friday = proposed night out "for us", AFK (AFK? we so crazy!)
Saturday = drive to Sheffield, possibly attend pub (in person! we so crazy!)
Sunday = eat turkey in Sheffield (real, not culinary synth! we soooo crazy!!)
Monday = big lunch with RL friends (see above), then drive back from Sheffield (two things? one day? we so craaazy!)
Tuesday = day off of E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G.
Wednesday = drive to Bournemouth, visit RL parents or RL friends (see above)
Thursday = day in Bournemouth by the sea (outdoors?! fresh air?!! just ...crazy!), visit RL parents or RL friends
Friday = travel back from Bournemouth, possibly meet more RL friends (see above)
Saturday = New Year's Eve {Party} {Please invite me}
Sunday = undefined.
Monday = meet with RL friends (see above)
Tuesday = back to grindstone, Tsingtao will still be @ home.

So possibly boxing day night, the next day (Tuesday), maybe Friday 30th eve or 31st day. 1st or 2nd are possibilities but reluctant to commit in advance in case of disappointment.

Am up for a BCNM 20 or a BCNM 30 (if jobs are useful) on any of the above.

[talizker]

WOW! Now thats an impressive lineup of holiday fun

To be honest, apart from Friday night (and hopefully! New Years Eve), my playtime will be the same as normal (evenings). I am working most of the time as usual and will be doing the family bit at other times so no chance for any games during the day. Just name the evening and I should be fine^^

Tobal - would definately be up for another bcnm20 and will gladly come along on your bcnm30 runs (BLM/WHM), even if I don't use a seal. Wedge, are you up for joining a bcnm20 run dude?

[Apathye]

Beastman Blood wasn?t 17k earlier this year. Back when I farmed it (so we?re talking September 2004 onwards) the price was 20k and would occasionally go up to 30k depending on market fluctuations. It stayed steady for a fair few months until gilsellers moved into the market and eventually people stopped bothering and when gilsellers got an almost 100% share of it, prices crept up steadily. Gilsellers left this market eventually (still the odd one but nowhere near how bad it was a year ago in this market) but the levels of people farming never reached the same amount so lack of supply led to further increased prices.

Prices on the server (and other servers by all accounts)have literally shot up on end products since last weeks update (for example, Scorpion Harness has seen a 50% price increase in a week, going from 8m to 12m, Haubergeon has gone from just over 5m to 7m, similar with Hauberk etc. Same with other ?high ticket? items such as Erase) I always hear that inflation is across the board but in this case it honestly isn?t as I checked it out.

Last night I looked at the Jeuno AH and picked 15 of the commonly farmed items (stuff like Beehive Chips, Beastman Blood, Silk Thread, Slime Oil, Tree Cuttings etc.) I found that in almost all cases the prices were more or less identical (fluctuations 1-2k either way) to before the price rises that started a week ago, and those that have risen are to nowhere near the same percentage (Beastman Blood was 100k just over a week ago and is now 110k).

Price rises are not uniform. If a player was farming Blood to get a Scorpion Harness 2 weeks ago they would have needed 80 stacks (100000 x 80 = 8m). Under the new prices they would have to farm 110 stacks (110000 x 110 = 12.1m).

The concept of prices all rising in tandem within an economy only works if there are no external factors at play but there is a big one in FFXI economy and that is gilselling websites. And this is why the prices have seen a massive hike over the last week. Sites such as IGE have literally slashed prices. 1m gil is now available for as little as $5-$9 which is nothing. Says a lot when a company like IGE have more influence over the economy than S-E themselves

Read this its kind of on the subject, quite interesting!

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fu...d-f8344370e421

[C']

A fascinating read but nothing too surprising at the same time.

I hope all those people who justify their gil purchases by whatever stupid reason read that and realise exactly what it is they are supporting every time they flash their credit card in IGE's direction.

But, as long as they have whatever +1 piece of flashy gear to flaunt in front of a group of people they will likely never meet, who cares about a bucnh of exploited workers.

[vwilsonuk]

Server Maintenance
From: FINAL FANTASY XI
Dec. 20, 2005 11:30
------------------------------------------------------------
All Worlds Maintenance (Dec. 20): Followup
------------------------------------------------------------
The new Fish Ranking feature which was excluded from the Dec. 12, 2005 version update will be introduced during the version update on Dec. 20, 2005 17:00 (GMT).

The information regarding the new Fish Ranking feature has been updated in the version update details announced on Dec. 12, 2005. Please refer to the version update details for more information regarding the Fish Ranking feature.
------------------------------------------------------------

[vwilsonuk]

(...)

[talizker]

This is a great extract from Milkman's "My Life in Vana'diel" diary on 1up.com It seems to echo the feelings most of us have about our Linkshell.

Full article here http://vanadiel.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3146509

I'm not a big fan of people who only want us to help them get their limit break items (papyrus is a classic example), or their AF because they can't make their own alliances to do it, or Promyvions, ZM battles, etc. We usually only invite people we've partied with regularly, and whose company we enjoy. Our numbers may be low (average attendance seems to be in the 20s), but we're capable of handling most non-mega-alliance-based situations (everything but Dynamis, or gods like Kirin) ourselves. I've said it to the Roundies in person and I'll say it again here: If I can't do it with them, I'd rather not do it at all. And I don't care whether everyone in this LS has 5 Osode's hanging in the closet or if they're wearing level 7 leather armor: I'll put any high level Roundabout up against any player from any other LS with maxed-out merits in everything. Our players are good, and if they're not good, we make them good.

It's always disappointing when someone you've either come up with, or someone you've helped rise through the ranks, gets restless and heads for greener pastures because they now want 1) their Relic gear, 2) God gear, 3) drops from tough NMs like Serket, or 4) go off chasing some cyber-tail (hey, guys, they probably don't look as good in real life - MEOW!), etc. My dream is to one day have enough of the same likeminded folks bound together by a common goal, who move as one, with none of the in-fighting, elitism, or snobbery that comes with applying for a "position" within one of every server's North American "HNMLS." Most of these shells are usually a cross-pollination of the players from the shells that disintegrated before them, with the average HNMLS lasting around 6-8 months before the leader either robs the coffers blind, quits, or MPKs every other LS on the server while camping a God or something.

Personally, I don't need that kind of behavior. I'm a grown man. The last thing I want is to deal with power-tripping teenagers, or even worse, power-tripping adults who live at home with mom, who think their Kirin's Osode means it gives them the right to berate other players. I don't need a Haidate that bad that I'm going to kiss some idiot's ass, when all that idiot does is yell at his linkshell members all day. I've never told a Roundie that he couldn't belong to other linkshells either. Of course if we've given you a pearl in the first place, we'd love to see you on 100% of the time, every day of the week, but if that's not in your best interest, we don't hold it against you either. What is unfortunate, though, is that Roundies often seems like the farm team for the HNM community. I could only imagine what we would be fighting right now if the people we've played with stayed pat. But I won't budge. If we have the numbers, we'll fight Gods 5 nights out of the week if everyone's up for it. But if we don't have the numbers, I'm content in spending quality time with the people we do have.

[vwilsonuk]

I especially like:

Our players are good, and if they're not good, we make them good.

Also, from further down Milkman's article:

It shocks me with how detached some people are from reality that they think they can conduct themselves in this manner while hiding behind their mommy's Pentium. You guys are so tough hitting that Provoke macro, yeah. The sad thing is there's idiots like this in every LS on every server talking the talk. I do hear, from my friends and associates at Square-Enix, of the well-organized and cooperative and well-behaved LSes on various servers (Seraph, I'm looking at you, baby). They're the ones with the maxed-out Relic weapons you don't see on Siren, unfortunately. They're the ones, if anyone can, who have a hope of ever beating Absolute Virtue. But hopefully one day we'll get our act together over here.

So perhaps some kudos for "expensive" Seraph, after all.

Bit of a shame he sees the HNMLS's and "social" LS's as so mutually exclusive, mind - we seem to be able to strike the balance generally. Also, he doesn't invite people who don't have their AF yet - if they're that warm and fuzzy, why not? Every person he invites who already has their AF is going to have to depart another linkshell (probably the one that helped them get it) to join his. Not helping with one specific thing is not a reliable tactic to avoid the pi$$ takers - you need to be able to recognize the signs.

[Tobal]

Amikiri, thats 1 NM i would like to beat, drops a Rare/ex G.K. weapon as well as the v.claw.

[Tsingtao]

Amikiri last night was funny and a chastening lesson that we're not quite so tough yet. I thought when we engaged we may have an outside chance but after we'd been wailing on her for about a minute or 2 and the health bar really hadn't moved that we'd bitten off lots more than we could chew. Then came the fateful message,

Amikiri readies Death Scissors
Rarehero take 2500 points of damage
Amikiri defeats Rarehero

Then she looked at me, I stood just 4 hits and I like to think I'm quite a well geared up tank for my level. Damage ranged from 150 to 450 per hit, today I'm feeling insipried to get some more xping done and come back and pay her a visit when I'm 75.