Archive for May, 2009
WARNING! The post contains ACP mission 1-7 screenshots, so if you’re terrified of spoilers, don’t read!
I’ll start this post with a great quote from my dear friend Malys:
Has been a busy week, I’ve been mostly working. On Tuesday we had an awesome Nyzul Isle run: we had only 5 members online but we got from floor 81 to floor 95 with 3 tags. Awesome job guys! When we started with the static the point of it was only to try a bit Nyzul Isle since none of us had done it before. I didn’t expect us to succeed as well as we have. But well, we have an amazing team with awesome players and we play very well together. I love my static! <3
I’ve been exping my SCH a bit but haven’t really gotten it anywhere. It’s almost level 62 now and I have a pretty nice gear for it. I tried to duo with Pytheans BLM a bit in Aydeewa Subterrane camp which was marked on BLM solo guide as a level 65-68 camp. We synced to my level 61 SCH and killed the qiqirn rangers pretty nicely, but the EXP would have been better with third member.
As you can see from the screenshot, my skill is still gimp and I get a lot of resists which is annoying. It’s getting better though. Also, because I haven’t posted a full AF pic of my SCH yet, here’s one (finnish side note: ommattu Malysille!!!!11):
Yesterday I had a day off from work so I decided to start ACP missions finally. I got missions 1-7 done and so far I’ve liked the mini expansion. Many people have complained about the lack of content and that it’s not worth the money but seriously, I don’t agree. The mini expansion costs 10 dollars / euros. With that amount of money, you can get a movie ticket or maybe two cheap beers. If you think it that way, it’s not a bad price for a few hours of gaming entertaiment.
Most of the missions were only cutscenes or quest like farming, which wasn’t bad. It got players to see some of the old zones once again and the farming didn’t really take that much time. The cutscenes have been really pretty and the story seems interesting. In my opinion, it resembles CoP a bit, which is a very good thing in my eyes. The missions have been really easy, soloable until mission 7 which was a piece of cake, but I don’t think it’s such a bad thing really. And I’ve heard the final battle is ridiculously difficult, so we’ll see how it all sums up.
When I was doing the goblin NMs, I kept running to this guy who was doing the missions too. When he came to the Qufim mandy fight with a couple of friends, I asked them to invite me too. It was funny because I never ever do stuff like that with random people… Hell, I don’t even do exp parties with random people! It made me realize I’ve developed a really negative attitude concerning the people outside my own LS and I felt ashamed. Anyway, I did the mandy fight and the mission 7 fight with these guys and I had a really good time, was nice to meet some new people!
Haven’t been playing much since I’ve been working, doing my final exams and such. On Saturday I was celebrating my birthday and as a result I suffered of the worst hangover ever on Sunday. I couldn’t get up from bed until 6PM when I ate some breakfast and logged in FFXI. Me and Red duoed a bit and then I had dyna at 8PM.
So I was still feeling more or less like a flubberworm and this one LS member started /telling me about points (I’m responsible of points in our dynamis LS). He asked if I have deducted points from him. I answered that yes I have taken him points for being absent without telling leaders beforehand. We used to have this rule that you don’t lose any points if you explain your absence after the run, but then members started not showing up and we couldn’t plan runs or setups or anything. So in March we changed the rule so that if you explain your absence beforehand you won’t lose any points, if you explain it after the run you lose 5 points and if you don’t explain it at all you lose 15 points.
So anyway, this member started complaining to me about this, saying it’s unfair and that I’m robbing his points and that he didn’t know about the rule. Well, in my opinion, if you are in an end game LS you should really know the rules, agree with them and follow them. If you don’t know the rules, that’s your problem, definitely not mine. Yeah, I know we haven’t always had this rule but hey, it’s been written on LS forums for over two months now. Also, he only lost 15 points in total (for 3 runs) because of this, and he wouldn’t have even lost them if he had bothered sending a /tell or POL message to one of the leaders before the run. So seriously, in my opinion, he shouldn’t have given me shit about it since it was 100% his own fault.
Yesterday I had a few hours before work so I spent them exping with Red again. We went to Vunkerl Inlet S and killed Goblin’s bat. The exp was quite nice but we wiped a few times. Anyway, I finally got my level 60 and Red got level 61. It’s schoolgirl time now! Unfortunately I don’t have any screenshots of that but I do have a cool screenshot of us going all Titanic:
Also, we got some new members on SecretFellowship and Red welcomed them in his very personal way:
It took me a few days to complete all SCH AF quest. They were mostly running around the world in the past… Three pieces required two key items which would pop in a random spot during certain weather/time/atmosphere/whatever. I was really lucky with them though, didn’t have to wait almost at all. The AF storyline was good in my opinion, quite creepy too. Not as good as PUP AF storyline but better than BRD or MNK. The only fight was really easy, I duoed it with Rednhot who also needed the piece for his SCH.
I tried to get a cool posing screenshot but unfortunately I had just pressed my Chakra gear macro so instead of looking cool I looked like this:
Kabutos are really scary though! Anyway, got my full AF – yus!
One LS member wanted Joyeuse for her RDM and I decided I could get one for my husbands PLD so we went to camp Charybdis. Luckily it popped within an hour and we got the sword. I’m camping the second one for my husband while I’m writing this, I hope I’ll get it soon.
Yesterday started the new Anniversary event. I read the event news on Playonline website but I misunderstood it, probably because my mind was full of the pure awesomeness of this ring:
I saw it right in front of my eyes: me storming SCH to 75 with my Kupofried’s ring, Anniversary ring and a normal EXP ring… But of course that was way too good to be true. As most of the players already know, there were only 11 tablets to be found on each server, and when a tablet was found, it disappeared. Only the people who found the tablets got the ring. On most (if not all) servers, all tablets were found within the first hour after event started, which means that people who weren’t actually camping the tablets right as the event started never had a chance of getting one.
So when I read the POL news about the event I understood that the Mog Tablets are there to stay and a player who collects all 11 of them will get the ring as reward. In my opinion this had made sense: every player, regardless of level/experience/time zone would have gotten an equal chance for getting the ring. Also, that would have meant you would have to work harder to get the ring: collect all the 11 tablets instead of just one.
People will most likely say that I’m just bitter. Well, of course I am! Who wouldn’t want that ring? I think the decision to let only 11 people get the ring every week (?) was bad. But hey, unfortunately I don’t make the decisions, I can only bitch about them.
Last Saturday we had a nice Nyzul Isle run with our static, we got from floor 61 to floor 80 with 4 tags. The only problems came when I accidentally warped us to next floor instead of exiting after clearing floor 75. But luckily we managed to clear floor 76 too and exited with about one or two seconds left. ^^; Tonight we have a Nyzul boss farming run and I’m hoping we get some nice drops.
On Saturday morning we also camped Adamantoise and got the claim! The egg dropped and we let Malys lot it since he already has wyrm beard. Now he only needs behemoth tongue and he gets his hot belt!
After the lucky Adamantoise camping I decided to try my luck with the Moldavite earring NM. When I was there waiting for the window to open a japanese RDM came there and asked me in Auto-Translate if I was camping the NM. I answered that yes, I was camping the earring. To my surprise she answered “Ok, I’ll just go afk and get some dinner. Good luck!” and let me have the NM! No one has ever done that to me before and I haven’t done that to anyone either so I was really surprised. It’s always nice to meet players who are really friendly. I will remember her name and hopefully I get to help her with something some day. Anyway, the NM popped and I got the earring, yay!
On Sunday we had Sky which was long and well… quite horrible. There’s one member in the LS who has a really bad attitude in my opinion. Every time we’re doing a god and another LS comes there this member goes on and on in linkshell chat about how they’re just trying to lag us and they’re hoping we wipe so they can steal our NM… He has a very hostile and unfriendly attitude and for me that makes the whole atmosphere negative.
I admit it, I just don’t know how to shut up when I find a person annoying, even though I really really should. And on Sunday I proved this to be true once again. We had a few Byakko pops and after we had killed the first a JP linkshell came there. They wanted to /random with our leader for the next pop. Our leader agreed and we lost, so the JP LS popped and well…started to wipe. So me and a few others started to cure/raise them to get them survive. This made this certain member ask in linkshell chat “Why are we raising them???” I was really annoyed with the persons attitude and answered in linkshell chat “It’s called ‘helping’, you should look it up from a dictionary” and that kinda made him explode… He started shouting about how he’s tired of “my shit” and so on. I really didn’t care. I just told him that if he has a problem, he should /tell me instead of creating some drama in linkshell chat.
Yes, I admit I was being mean and I shoudn’t have said anything. But I also think he really overreacted. Anyway, I’ve been thinking about quitting doing sky altogether since I see my friends anyway in other events and people like that really piss me off for some reason. No point in doing in game events if you don’t really enjoy doing them. Also, I finally got Ahands last Sunday. Now I’m only missing Osode and I’m done with Sky for now.
Yesterday I had a short linkshell EXP party where I kept getting R0 and d/cing… I also had to afk to solve some family problems so I was pretty much a horrible party member. After the party we had Limbus, Apollyon SW. My thoughts were still on all the real life stuff I have going on and I made so many mistakes… We also had three new members on that run and the first run they saw went really badly. One person got left out and because of me we lost some AF items and coins. I felt pretty much horrible after the run, I was such a bad leader. I just hope our members don’t become frustrated with me being such a noob. But well, at least we cleared the zone.
It has been quite a busy week for me in real life. I started my new job which is fun but I’ve been really tired after the days I’ve been working. On Monday we did Central Temenos Second floor for the first time and we have now 2/3 of our first Ultima pop. I’ve been also thinking about doing 2 zones at a time to get Omega/Ultima pops faster since we only have Limbus runs once a week.
Other than that, I’ve been camping Adamantoise and Behemoth a bit with my friend Malys. We haven’t had a lot of luck though, he has claimed one Ada and one Behe during last few days and we haven’t gotten any Black Belt items to drop. But I noticed camping Adamantoise is a nice way to get some buffer, the Valley of Sorrows Fields of Valor is just awesome!
Other than camping, I haven’t really done anything. I’m hoping to get some EXP for my SCH this weekend so I can start doing the AF quests.
JPbutton.com has done really nice work with trying to get JP and NA/EU players to communicate with each other. They recently gave English speaking players a chance to ask questions from JP players and now they have posted some questions from JP players for English speaking players to answer.
The questions made me think JP players assume all NA/EU players are rude and play in a certain way: they replace themselves in exp party without giving notice or asking other party members, they do missions and BCs totally unprepared and they don’t bother with search comments or Auto-Translate. For me this is certainly untrue since I’m an EU player and I don’t act like this. I’m really sad about the image JP players have of us EU/NA people and I wish there’s something we can do to fix it. However, I also hope JP players would rethink their attitude and question their own prejudices.
I wanted to answer to the questions but in many cases I felt they aren’t directed at me since I don’t leave a party without giving a notice, I do use search comment, I prepare for missions and so on… Anyway, here are my answers:
1. Do foreign players have a lot of interest in joining social Japanese Linkshells? (Especially ones with only JP members) I ask because when I recruit for my shell in Japanese, I get a lot of tells from foreigners looking to join. Personally, I feel like even if they could understand my /shout, it still would be hard to keep up with regular conversation. They wouldn’t understand pop-culture references to old TV shows, for instance.
I personally don’t understand why anyone would like to join a social linkshell where they can’t take part in conversation. I haven’t heard about EU/NA people wanting to join JP linkhsells either. Maybe they want to learn Japanese?
2. Parties that cycle in replacement members seem to be popular amongst foreigners, but a lot of times the party will just disband once the replacement arrives. Of course, there are times when the replacement is contacted before they get all the way there, but there are many instances when no one says anything. There are also many cases where inappropriate jobs are invited and the party can no longer function well.
To me, this is a big reason behind some of the negative images Japanese players have about foreign players. What do you think about this?
This is one of the reasons I don’t like to join random pickup parties anymore. I find it rude to replace yourself without asking other party members beforehand. I think that when you join a party, you should be ready to exp at least an hour or two. As a party leader, I prefer to disband the whole party when someone needs to leave.
3. Why does it seem like many foreign players don’t bother to bring medicines and potions to Missions and BCs? Many Japanese players make sure to have Vile Elixirs, Hi-Potions and/or Reraise Earrings.
It’s hard for me to comment this as I only do missions and BCs with my linkshell friends, and all of them are always well prepared. I see this problem happening when you do missions and such with people you don’t know: you can’t even tell if they have any idea what they need to do.
4. Sometimes I see foreign pick-up parties recruiting for members using Auto-Translate, but then when I join the party, all the conversation and battle planning is in English. I’ll ask for them to {Please use the Auto-Translate function.} but nobody ever does. If you are going to /shout for help with the Auto-Translator, why not use it in the party? It feels like I was tricked.
If there are japanese members in my party, I try to use Auto-Translate as much as possible, but I have noticed most people just talk in English. However, every time I’ve been in JP exp pt, they’ve talked in Japanese instead of using Auto-Translate, too.
5. How many NA and EU players do Campaign? Any thoughts about the recent nerf to Fortifications?
Most of my online friends do Campaign, and every one of them is really frustrated with the Fortification nerf. It seems most no one does battles at beastmen zones anymore since the exp reward isn’t worth the time spent.
6. What equipment do you think has great stats but horrible looks? What equipment do you think has the best graphics?
I find all harnesses / subligar horrible. Also the Goliard Saio set comes to mind. I like the looks of Sha’ir and Nashira manteel sets (but only on female players) and most ToAU pieces. The new mini expansion pieces look nice too.
7. Outside of your normal party gear, is there any equipment that you go out of your way to get strictly for looks? What are your favorite pieces of casual equipment?
No, there’s no equipment I’d get only for looks.
8. I’m a Mithra, and I find that a lot of foreigners seem to be into Mithra fashion. They examine me and ask where I got my equipment and such. Do you think male players enjoy dressing up their Mithra in cute outfits?
I have no idea about that. I’m a female player myself and play an Elvaan female character.
9. I wonder if you calculate the XP/hr of parties, and if so, do you think that Skillchain/Magic Burst or Weaponskill spam produces the best results? Before parsing became widespread, Japanese players used to think Skillchain/Magic Burst was the best.
I usually calculate XP/hr but I don’t worry about it much as long as it’s ok (and “ok” depends on level). At level 75 merit party, the fastest exp seems to be melee burn with RDM healer and one or two bards. However, at lower levels SC+MB can make the exp better, or at least more fun. I usually try to organize a SC+MB if there’s a BLM in the party.
10. How come it seems like so many people don’t utilize Search Comments properly? Why don’t they write their camp location for others to see? Also, it’s strange to see so many people seeking without basic information written like available jobs and where they can access. Don’t you want an invite?
Well, I don’t know why people don’t use them. I always do and when there are new players in our linkshell, I try to teach them to use them too. Personally, I don’t usually invite people without search comments.
11. If you know you are going to be busy, how come you don’t alert people at the beginning of the party instead of surprising everyone at the last minute?
I always tell everyone at least 30 mins before I have to go and won’t join a party if I don’t have at least a couple of hours for exp.
12. Honestly, the largest difference in thinking between Japanse and foreign players exists in the Merit party. You often say 5 DDs and a RDM is so good, but having a single, solitary healer is hard on the RDM. Japanese realize that healers can be in short supply, so we make sacrifices to lighten their burden, like subbing a mage job, or using Utsusemi. I feel like many people don’t show proper respect to healers.
When we say JP ONLY, it isn’t always an issue of language,but the fact that we feel there are other dangers and demerits associated with a non-JP party, stemming from our different play-styles, that we wish to avoid.
This key difference in thinking, more than any race or language issue, is what really sets us apart as players. They are just looking to sit back, relax and earn some decent XP.
Please feel free to provide your own insight and thoughts.
I don’t really think all NA/EU people play in a certain way and all JP people play in another way… Some people only want the best exp and some people just want to relax and have fun.
I’ve been leveling SCH pretty fast, got it level 20-45 in about a week in nice linkshell parties. We usually sync to level 20-30 and get some really sweet exp in Qufim or the jungles. It’s so fun and relaxing to exp with friends, I don’t want to exp in pickup parties ever again.
Of course exping on low level has brought some problems too. I’m getting levels really fast and with them all these new spells and abilities I don’t really know how to use. I’ve never played a mage job before (I don’t really count BRD as one because it’s so different than for example a WHM or RDM) so I have a lot to learn and I don’t think I’m keeping up with the job that well… I guess I just have to play with all my new cool spells and abilities and see what they do.
Another problem with low level exping is being gimp. My gear is pretty much absolutely ridiculous, but as I’m mostly leveling in low level zones or soloing/duoing I can’t get myself to bother with amazing gear. I’m pretty much wearing Elvaan RSE and some Seers pieces with normal quality INT and MND rings. But as I’m leveling quite fast, I think it’s time to start thinking about getting some actually nice pieces of gear.
So here’s a little to-get-list for my SCH for level 60ish:
- Staves: Fire Staff 35K, Aquilo’s Staff 120K, Wind Staff 10K, Thunder Staff 15K, Water Staff 30K and Light Staff 30K (total 240K).
- Ammo: Phantom Tathlum (level 66) 60K
- Head: Scholar’s Mortaboard (level 60) AF
- Neck: Beak Necklace (level 50) 7K
- Body: Glamor Jupon (level 50) quest –> Scholar’s Gown (level 58) AF
- Hands: Scholar’s Bracers (level 52 AF)
- Waist: Penitent’s Rope (level 60) 300K
- Legs: Scholar’s pants (level 56) AF
- Feet: Scholar’s Loafers (level 54) AF
- Back: Red Cape +1 (level 43) 50K
- Ears: Moldavite earring (level 47) NM, Antivenom Earring (level 50) Assault, Insomnia Earring (level 50) Assault
- Rings: Balrahn’s Ring (level 50), Zoredonite Ring (level 56) NM
Total gil needed: 657K
Looks like I need to figure out a way to make gil again.
I’ve camped some NMs lately too. We got Adamantoise ToD today (it was actually unclaimed a while but we were too slow getting there) and I’ve been camping KA with my friend Malys. We also killed Moldavite earring goblin NM two times yesterday but no earring. We need two so I hope we’ll start getting drops soon.
In August 2008 I started a FFXI blog at Blogspot. However, after a few months and some things happening both in real life and in game, I didn’t feel much like playing, and then I also stopped updating the blog. At the time, I was a MNK 75, PUP 73 and BRD 71. I had recently gotten Sea and joined Europa LS, which did all kinds of end game events: Einherjar, Sea, Sky, ENMs and KSNMs, Limbus and some NMs. I also did ZNM with Epic LS and Dynamis with ShadowHearts LS. On top of that, I had a social LS called SecretFellowship, which had quite a lot of events too.
Of course, after a while all the events got really tiring and I found myself not having fun anymore while playing. In October, I left Europa LS and after that I quit doing ZNM and Einherjar. I started salvage, but our group didn’t work very well and split up after a few runs. In the end, my only event in game was Dynamis, and I didn’t really log in for anything else either.
I basically took a break from the whole game except Dynamis, and that felt good. But now I’ve found myself interested in playing again. I still do Dynamis once a week and I like it a lot. I’m one of the leaders in our Dynamis LS ShadowHearts and we have a nice group. Most of my in game friends are in the LS so I’m always having fun during our runs. I also do the points and lot list for the LS and help with updating LS rules and stuff. It takes quite a lot of time since the LS has two runs a week and I want to have the point list fully updated before every run, but I like being able to help the LS in that way.
My other and most important linkshell is SecretFellowship. We founded it last summer with my husband and a couple of friends. At the time we only had two members with level 75 jobs, most of our members were new players. Nowadays we have around 25 more or less active members from all over Europe. I have many close friends in the LS who are the main reason for me to keep playing. During my time in the linkshell, I’ve met some really amazing people and had a lot of good time. Here are some screenshots from our events with SecretFellowship:
I also have a Sky LS Phailure, which has runs twice a week, though mostly I can only attend the Sunday runs because of my busy real life schedule. I mostly do Sky because I like it and I want to help my friends to get the stuff they want from there. I also have two things on my personal wish list: Ahands and Osode. I’m not in any hurry with getting them though.
In real life, I’m soon 23 years old university student. Hopefully I’ll graduate as Bachelor of Arts this spring. After that, I’ll continue studying for my Master of Arts diploma. I’ll probably spend at least two or three more years at the university. I also got a costumer service job in a movie rental place, which I’ll start on Monday. Other than playing FFXI and (soon) working, I spend my time reading and writing, watching movies and going out with friends.
In game, I play a character called Evyen on Caitsith server. I have three jobs at level 75: Monk, Bard and Puppetmaster. I have some regular events: Dynamis, Limbus, Nyzul Isle and Sky. I enjoy doing quests and missions, and I also try to help my friends whenever I have time for it. I like crafting and my goal is to level Goldsmithing to 100 one day. It’s level 50 at the moment, so I have a long way to go. At the moment I’m also leveling Scholar, which is level 39 now. It will hopefully be my next 75 job.
So, this is the beginning of my new FFXI blog. This will be the place where I write about my adventures, dreams and accomplishments in the world of Vana’diel. I hope you enjoy reading about them. ^^