Fist de Yuma - April 2, 2002

Rambling thoughts I had a small complaint last time about the length of the last column. He said to put in a warning so you don't start reading ten minutes before dinner. This will be short unless there is some really big adventures tomorrow. I had a tribute column set up for a great player who was leaving. He sounded so sure that we were convinced he was gone. He had some personal problems that affect him. After a time to think he is not leaving, only making some changes in how he will play. So I lost a major section of the column. Then I made the error of installing Baldur's Gate 2. That took up a full day. I will likely put in a day or so a week on that until I finish it. If course my wife got a little worried when I played it for 17 hours straight. It got worse because before I could sleep the wife's family members called about having lunch in Mexico. We also did a lot of shopping and spent a bit if time in line getting back over the border. Let me tell you something, it is not only AC that people think they are too good to stand in line. The line wrapped around the block. This left an elbow where people coming to the border would see the line. They would then have to talk down the side street to get to the end of the line. It was a natural thing for those who think they are better than others to just walk up and join the line in the middle. There was nothing I could do about the old couple that walked in front of us. I was pissed, hot and tired. Then three teenagers walked up. We had already been in line about a half and hour and it was over 90 degrees. I only had two beers so I was in control. My brother-in-law had just come from a bar with one but I passed on it. I had also been up around 30 hours by then. The three teenagers looked at the line and one said, "I think that is up there." They preceded to walk pass us to the head of the line. I was just enough in control not to start a fight. I told Ray if I had one more beer we would have had a battle. I might be 52 and they were three of them but I fight dirty. The next day was an Easter party that lasted until 7pm. So there was a lot of lost AC days this week. Anyway there is only one AC story in this week. Between patch dry spell makes for less adventures. Messing up There are times when you quickly read something and not get the true jest of what is being written. I made that error last week. For something that important I should have been more careful. What Turbine said was adding a percentage of melee defense to magic defense would make MONSTERS magic defense out of sight. I somehow read mages. I had not thought of monsters. I don't know if the monsters can spec' a skill but of not that could make a difference. The point is moot as Turbine has rejected the solution. I can only hope that what they have is great and comes soon. Queen Quest, Spray There was a note on the board about needing support for the Queen quest. Myself, Mars-Hill and Tavvaz all volunteered. Because we were invited as support none of us wanted to take over. Each of the three of us assumed one of the other two was running things. I was a little late getting started. Thursday is a one of the days I spend with the wife and I cannot break that time. They were at the dam getting sprayed by the time she was in bed. I was told that if I hit the switch they would hold the door for me. I really hate the dam. Vapor golems in the open are a snap. Five, Six, bring them on. As long as they don't chain cast on me I have little problem. Give me two in that fog and I have big trouble. I buffed up well for Olthoi and Golems. The run up the dam was no trouble and I did not have to kill much to make a path. At the drop I targeted all the golems I could see and vulned them for cold. After jumping I decided to run to the passage before fighting. After running around, totally disorientated, I found the passage. I battled three Vapors there. I got the gated picked and moved in. There I was attacked by Olthoi. @##~!@#$, wrong passage, back into the fog. The other passage is a short distance from there. Killed a few more Vapors and one Diamond golem in the passage. The problem I have with Vapors is knowing you're being attacked. The fog and lighting is such that you can hardly see them. Your dots tend to blend in on the radar. You finish off one and only know is another by the noise. A few acid blasts finished off the lightning monsters and I pulled the switches. They said the door was held. Back into the fog and killing Vapors. My plan was not to try and fight the Olthoi. I can but it would take a while. By the time I hit the river of acid I had a whole lot on me. I was not willing to run around the acid, trying to unlock the gate, with ten Olthoi on my back. If they clogged the passage back a failed pick would kill me easy. I killed them, taking about two minutes, and ran into the acid. I learned early that 330 lock pick was not enough unless I weakened the lock. Not wanting to chance the acid for long I ran over, tossed weaken lock and ran back. I took damage but not enough that I needed to run back. I had to clear three more Olthoi that spawned before running back to pick the lock. I got into the passages and there was no one there. Neither the gate nor the door was held. To say the least I was a bit ticked. I messaged the group about the doors. They said the door was head. Humm, there must be another place for this. A short time later Mar-hill showed up to lead me to the other gate. This one did not require a lock picked door or crossing acid. Not sure how fast the spawn is. As I hit the gate my timer went off. I had a short time to rebuff. Several EV's spawned and I quickly killed one. LOL I was sprayed! I told Mars-hill I was sprayed and out of buffs. They were just waiting for me anyway so we ported out. Queen Quest I wanted to put a bunch of discouraging titles to this one. I could not think of one that fit. Just what happened I don't know. I'll leave all the names out other than the two I already mentioned. We meet at the plateau and ran to the hive. There was a bunch of people outside buffing up. I was buffed so I said I was running to the Royal hive and wait. I knew not to log there as the stupid quest jumpers and macro people messed that up for us. If you log in the hive you end up back at the LS when you log back. Before I started in several non-Elders showed up. Normally we do have a few non-Elders but only those we really know well. I had never seen these guys before. Normally that means a chain ppl. The ones who don't cheat get known names. The two Elders who had formed this quest said they were their friends. At this time I had several questions posed. Who was the leader? Who was the killer? Who was the Melee drawer? What path to the den would we take? Were we doing keeping the switch puller back for the first kill or not? Who were the Back Guards? Is there any change in our normal technique? I was not getting any answers back. I'll explain how we do the quest for the new readers. There are several ways through the hive. Each needs a person pulling switches to open doors. The doors can be held and the switch puller can then run to the end. The problem comes when the switch puller thinks they did one route and the party goes another. With fast spawns the puller or a holder can die if there is too much delay. It is also easy for a melee holder to get dragged off the door. The first trip through the hive is to kill the Queen while she is stuck in the egg layer. She will not move from there until killed. We can de-buff her and blast without too much danger. She will then reform fully ready to fight and can kill a mage in seconds. There are very few melee that can stand against her without a lot of support. After the first Queen dies we rush to the portal. Delaying at all will give you a good chance to leave a body. I have done that before. After that you redo that passage to the end and attack the second Queen. The second Queen is a lot different. You have one to two melee jump down while the mages stay on the ledge. You have to have people with a lot of different jobs. The jobs are; Back Guard. There are Broods and other Olthoi on that ledge. The Back Guards defend the people on the ledge. We have left a lot of people dead on the ledge when we set to weak a Back Guard. Healers. This requires three good healers per melee. High Mana Conversion is needed here. Also a mage or life/melee with a Healer Heart will do. Their job is to heal the melee's facing the Queen. The Queen can put out massive damage in a short time. Elder was one shot down there. They also have to be ready to put stamina on the Melee(s) as that will go fast. De-buffer. The de-buffer needs very high creature and life skills. An Og is great for this. Depending on who the killer is you need a bunch of spells. The de-buffer needs to be ready to reapply the de-buffs in battle. VII's are on a short timer and in many a battle they have expired. Nothing worse than to have an almost dead Queen who's quickly goes back to full health. Lastly is the killer. This is mostly a mage. We have had Swords do it but failed with every UA and Archer we have tried. I'm sure a UA can do it. I know that with some tricks it is easy to get an Archer the kill. What I learned on this trip will help me get a kill for an Archer, unless it is fixed. There are tricks to do it in one pass but it is not hard to do it in two so why risk it? A lot of parties have left everyone dead at her feet. The two pass also prevents problems with the wrong person getting the kill. With set people doing the damage there is no chance of that happening. Ok, back to our quest. I never got an answer to my questions. Finally Mars-Hill said he would take charge. I said I would lead the party to the end. My route is simple and fast if everyone works together and the puller know what switch to pull. The puller did not know which switches so we knew there would be a little delay while he found it. At the locked door three people tried to hold it. I got that fixed and headed to the jump. I jumped and for at least 30 seconds I was alone. I never found out why it took to long for them to join me. North, and then slightly west to a passage. We waited there until the door was opened. One person held the door and we move down, killed a few Olthoi and followed the right wall a short distance to another passage and a gate. A bit later that was opened. Follow that one to the end and again follow the right wall to a passage and the last gate. This last one is not as easy to see and some have rushed passed it. To prevent that I rushed to it and stood there blasting Olthoi. To my amazement I was alone again. There should have been three more people with me. It seemed that one of the non-Elders thought they were at the end and had the rest stayed at the last door. So much for following me. One person showed up and helped me clear the Olthoi. The door opened and I held it. The people coming up from the start picked up the stragglers and we all got to the end. We had ten minutes on the buff so I said lets go. The first pass takes little time. We had to clear the Broods, EV's and other Olthoi from the upper ledge. I tossed Yield on everything so the other Mages had little trouble finishing them off. At the ledge everyone was lined up so I said jump. The battle is not long but I wanted to insure we did not lose buffs before the first Queen died. I jumped and started battling Broods and Guards. To my horror I was along again! Surrounded by Guards, Broods and EVs I could only heal and hope the rest got off their ass and joined me. Totally defensive I send a massage asking them to please join me. Finally Mars-Hill and Tavvaz did, the rest joining later. With everyone there the plan was to move to the exit. Then we would defeat the guards, de-buff the Queen, kill and rush to the portal. I rushed to the exit portal but no one joined me. With no monsters on me at that time I started de-buffing the first Queen. I dared not attack her until the rest of the party joined me at the exit. The Elders joined me at the exit but the Non-Elders started attacking the Queen. I had no choice but to join in the attack. With my de-buffs they were doing a lot of damage. The first Queen fell and my view was blocked for a sec. When I could see what happened the Queen was still at the egg pod. I was sure we had got the first Queen but this one acted like the first one. As it was not moving and we had people in back of her I started tossing de-buffs. After Yield and several other spells I saw she was a half health and still not moving. I started blasting and she fell. It seemed that the non-Elders were totally out of place. Mars-Hill moved to a spot that blocked her movement against the egg pods and him. He stayed alive by not attacking. Without his quick thinking the non-Elder would have been dead in seconds. She would send out acid missiles but not move. The non-Elders were behind the eggs so the Queen could not charge them. It is one of the tricks so it seemed we were not on the same page. After she died there was no more Queens so that was the second one. I was trying to see who got the kill but had trouble getting it on my screen. It kept scrolling off. I finally got it and it was one of the non-elder mages. As this quest was for their friends mage I was a bit ticked. Then I found that the killer's timer was not up! I tried to click on the Queen's body but someone was using it. With short buffs because of the mess up we had to port out fast. The Guards were nothing to face without a lot of buffs. After porting out we found that the guy who got the kill could not pick up the head. At least that was what he said. I know for a fact that people whose timer was not up had got a head. Strangely several Elders opened up the body and there was no head on it. Someone got it. Some of the non-elder logged at that point. No one would admit to having the head. Now I'm a little more volatile than most. As if you don't know that. I'm over it but for a while you could have fried an egg on my forehead. Next week we have it set for The Crippler to get it kill. I'm hoping that I can get Fist the kill someday but it is a bit hard for a UA to do it. Mars-Hill had failed several times but I think he had a poor de-buffer. Several times a sword had got the kill with little trouble. After The Crippler we will try to get Mars his title. We have one non-Elder invited who will go for the kill if The Crippler dies. That is Gimp with a Limp. He has been a great friend of Elders for a long time. He also is not a high level mage who had no idea what he is doing, unlike many mages I meet these days. Little different play I have played my BM on Wintersebb. He is 12lv and not that bad. My problem is his War and Life is high enough to do level III spells but his Mana Conversion is not up to supporting III's. Also without item almost everything is a hit and run affair. My best thing to hunt is Limestone Golems. At 1000 points a pop they are well worth hunting. I tried my old spot at the Lugie fort but I had done that to many times for it to be fun. Also I don't have the pyreal support I had on other servers so the comp burn to xp was far to low. Without item I cannot bane and without banning there is few things I can face to face fight. With a 10 quick start and no Creature buffs I have to run very early. A Limestone is about all I can outrun at this point. So leveling will be very slow with him for a bit. I'll keep you posted.