Fist de Yuma - July 20, 2004

Corrections and info Trying to write a column in a single day runs the risk of making a lot of mistakes. While my grammar was not that bad, I made numerous mistakes in content. I'm going to start this column with corrections to those errors. There are nine members on a team in the Tour de France, not seven. Greg LeMond is the proper spelling of his name. Greg LeMond won three tours, not five. Jan Ullrich has been second five times, not three. Tyler Hamilton did not drop out of last years race with a broken collarbone, he finished in forth, an amazing show of courage. The name of the quest I wrote about is Hopeslayer, not Harbringer. A big thanks to Richard Cox for helping me out with the Tour mistakes. I'll take the constructive criticism and stop flaming my own column. (g) I can be my own worst critic at times. While that may be healthy overall, there is no need to lead the column with it. I'm told that the Hopeslayer reward is sharable. One reader told me that their allegiance runs this regularly for their lower level members. The big guns clear it, and let the weaker members grab the reward and port out. The Hunt for Granite One of the main things I have been looking for is Granite. I have gotten a lot of new weapons, and will need to get them improved. The collection of Granite was slow but steady, when I was hunting the 60+ matron. For some reason, Granite is almost nonexistence in the 80+ matron. I got a recommendation from Yu-Huang on a place to hunt for Granite. This was in the passage leading to the Lugian fortress. The path to the fortress is easy for me. It is close to Old Mine, and I know the route there like the back of my hand. From my 18th level, until my 26th level, I fought in Old Mine. This may not seem like much today, but back then it was a lot of hunting to make those levels. The fast route is through a dungeon in Arwic. It is an easy run, if you know the route. Of course I can remember being lost in there for hours on end, before I learned how to navigate dungeons. Yu-Huang was right about the Granite. There was a lot more there than any other place I have hunted. Unfortunately, it also bored me to death. My Salvage mule ripped through them like tissue paper. Even with a better drop of Granite, it was far to slow for me. There had to be a better way to do this. Trading days I'm not a very good trader. I tend to pay too much for things I want, and charge to little for things I no longer need. While that might make me a lot of friends, it makes it hard to acquire trade material. I gathered up some things that might be good for trading. The only thing I had of real value is Mahogany. I do need the Mahogany, but I've been finding it, and not finding Granite. So I decided to use the Mahogany as trade material. I also had a ring of 12 sings, several hundred plats and around 50 MMD notes. I hit the boards asking for Granite. I got several hits about trades. I also found some trades on the boards and made a bid on those. The end result was around 40 bags of granite. One of the things that helped was the bots in the Marketplace. I was able to pick up some Granite bags for sings. Some bots sold for one sing a bag, others for two. I found one bot that wanted a pack cow. I had an old one sitting on the floor of my house. That was worth 200 points, with a Granite bag going for 30 points. You would think that my search was over at that point. The problem is, I needed from four to five bags of granite for each weapon. After tinking up a few of Fist's and Jr's weapons, I was short of Granite again. I'll be counting on the bots to keep me supplied for a while. That means a few hunts for sings and other tradable items. I was also told that Tuskers are dropping a lot of granite. I normally don't hunt them, as I prefer Olthoi. Fist's Armorer is 123, and I would like to start pushing him some more. The fastest way to do that is by fighting Tuskers. So I can kill two birds with one stone. I'll likely wait until after the Salvage Mules are where I want them, before doing that. Meanwhile, I'll have to decide what to do with some of the weapons I have left over. I have replaced several weapons with better stuff. I'll have to decide if I should give them away to members, or put them up for trade. I'll likely give them away, like I said, I'm a lousy trader. Renegade Stronghold I got a call from William the Bat, asking if we wanted to go on the Renegade Stronghold quest. I sent out a quick message to the members, and loaded Fist's Armorer. Both our allegiances are hometied in Tou-Tou, so getting together was easy. The quest has no lower level limit, so we had a lot of players who were at risk of dieing. The ones who had to be careful were; Dibbuk (58), Static X (63), The Dark of Dragoon (52) and Voxell (33). I had no idea what this quest was about. Many of the newer quests are team things. I tend to quest solo. When I do go on a team quest, it is generally in support of others. For this reason, I had never even seen a Burun before. Fist de Mage is generally the best person to take on quests like these. He is a world-class de-buffer. I only took Fist's Armorer because of my desire to push him. Despite his limitations, he did well. I think we took two portals to get there. In any case it was fast. Before much time we were elbow deep on combat. There were a few others players we picked up on the way, but our fellow had; William the Bat (126+), Miss Smurfette (126+), Fist's Armorer, (123), Yu-Huang (81), Idjiid (75), this was in addiction to the weaker players listed above. I think Ken' was there as well, but he was outside of our fellow. After a series of battles, we got to a big room. We drew out a few monsters, and I started working on a Tumeorok named War Chief Amanua. Miss Smurfette had already got an announcement for killing a Lugian called General Fostok. When I killed Amanua, not and easy thing to do, I also got an announcement. From there we moved up a hall to a circular room. It was filled with lots of Tumeorok and Lugians, all tough fighters. With our power, and the support of others who joined us, we had little trouble keeping the room clear. The lever levels were allowed to get the Helm and BP. It was fortunate that Dibbuk got his reward early, because a Lugian rock took him out with one hit. I recovered his body. It seems that the main monsters were not so melee friendly. The mages seemed to be getting most of the announced kills. This was despite me vuln'ing and imperiling everything before going into attack mode. I found that General Folsok was the hardest one to fight. I barely had to heal when fighting War Chief Amanua. General Folsok hits hard and forced me to heal numerous times during out fight. As players got the rewards, they started porting out. This included the big hitters who used us to get to the reward. There was a risk of a wipe out. If some of the bigger hitters die, there tends to be a domino effect, and everyone dies. William the bat was aware of this risk. He quickly organized our group to be more effective, and cutting the risk of a wipe out. After he asserted his leadership, the battle became much safer. At first I was not sure if the reward was worth picking up. A quick glance showed I did not have a use for them. At the very end, I decided to grab the Helm and BP, just to have them. I might have a vassal who wants them someday. After everyone who needed the helm and BP got one, including people who joined us later or drifted in during the battle, we all ported out together. It was a fun quest. It is unquestionably a team event. The monsters are not the super strong, hard to kill types, but there are so many that even strongest players would be overwhelmed. I like this type of quest. One super strong monster, which can take out any player they focus on, seems dry and static to me. The chaos of this battle kept us all on our toes, while allowing the lower levels to have a chance at completing the quest. We knew we were at risk, but good teamwork and tactics was the key, not overwhelming power. Salvage Mules I'm almost done with Salvage Mule One. He is at a higher level than SM2 now. The only reason I'm still playing him is a desire for self-buffing. I have all the magic skills and only need to raise them to a level VII capability. I used to think I needed a base magic skill of 245, but I'm finding I need a little more. The current goal is a base 250, which I'll have at level 91 or so. That too may be a touch low, I'll know when I get done. The end goal is a buffed skill of 320 for all the schools. I'll still fizzle a lot, but that seems to be the key number to shoot for. I'm picking up a lot of nice weapons while hunting SM1. I've blown up most of them, but a few nice ones hit. Notable was a 100, 100 BS/2 rated UA Acid weapon. While Acid is not the greatest element to have, such a weapon is still valued. Of more use, is an 94, 94 rated Fire UA. I think the one I had was rated below 70. I'm pleased with the results of this project. It has kept me out of a lot of adventures, as I have had to focus a lot of time with the mules. I'll need a few months more to finish off the project, but the increase in power, for all my players, makes the time more than worth it. After this is done, I'll start on the next project. That will be levelling the trade mules to max. I'll be doing the same things I do now; only the passup xp will go to the trade mules. In the meanwhile, I'll be collecting weapons, armor and salvage. When I do go back to hunting with my main killers, they will all be much better equipped. Anal people There are people who get a bug up their end. That does not bother me. What they want to do is their business. Where I get ticked is when they demand everyone else follow their idea on how to play, and punish those that don't. Most of us are anal about something. Mine is having someone attack what I'm fighting. While it irks me, I don't demand people not do it, and I especially don't kick someone out of the fellow for it. It is easy to level in the Matrons. Even solo, a player can grab 12 million an hour, and that is with looting. If you don't loot, you can grab a bit more. When there are a lot of players in the Matron, which is most days, it does not matter if you loot or not. Most Olthoi are dead soon after spawning and we spend a lot of time in search of something to kill. Still, there are people who don't like to loot. Not only do they not like to loot, they feel others looting is affecting them. Logic has no effect on these anal players. I first came across one of these in the 60+ matron. There were players who clearly belonged in the 80+. A 105 UA or Sword can almost sleep in the 80+, for all the danger they are in. A Mage or Archer has a hard time, but even a no melee defense Melee takes little damage, with proper equipment and play. The xp difference between the 60+ matron and the 80+ is dramatic. A good day in the 60 might net 17 million an hour. A good day in the 80+ can net 30. Normal is a lot lower of course. I have seen it as low as 10 million in the 60+ and 15 in the 80+. Those are extremes but you get the idea. About normal are 15 in the 60+ and 20 in the 80+. I asked one of the 100+ sword fighters why he was fighting in the 60+. He stated that too many players looted in the 80+. He said that looting reduced the xp flow so he moved to the 60+. Lets get this straight, he moved to a place that averages five million less xp per hour, because the looters in the 80+ reduced the xp flow. Like I said, logic is not their strong point. When I moved to the 80+, I noted the exact opposite as far as to looting. Even when looting was not reducing the xp very much, few if any were looting. Most did not care one way or the other about looting, because they realized it did not affect anyone very much. I was talking to a very nice player who was somewhat upset. She had been kicked out of the main fellow because the leader did not like her looting. I thought that was an aberration and told her that looting should be standard, not the exception. Then I met a player who refused to join the fellow. White players, a term to those hunting outside of the fellow, will reduce the xp flow. There are not enough Olthoi to hunt as it is. With six or more players, we spend most of our time looking for something to kill. Having a player clearing spawns, and the fellow getting nothing for it, hurts everyone. The fellow gets less, the white player gets less, and there is no reason for it. When I asked him why he refused to join the fellow, he stated that he took a lot of lip for looting. He plays for fun, and taking lip from some anal moron was not fun. The white player was there for loot. He did not care about the xp. While he did not want to hurt the fellow, he was sure he was not welcome anyway. So now the anal players are starting to hurt us. The real problem is when they get to be the fellow leader. They have no qualms with kicking a player who offends their anal standard of play. There is only one way to deal with people like this. That is to remove them from the fellow if they criticize others for looting. I'll give them one warning. If they become the fellow leader and start their griefing, start a new fellow. For the most part, the anal players will not listen to reason. It may seem harsh to punish them in this manner, but the damage they do overall, makes them a big threat. The Matron fellows are fun and productive. The "Shut up and Hunt" and the "No looting allowed" anal players need to go hunt solo, where their antics will not effect the real players. The Tour de France This week in the Tour has been amazing. The two main threats to Lance Armstrong have fallen by the wayside. Tyler Hamiton's injuries, from the early crashes, were too much for him. Despite taking fourth in last year's Tour, with a broken collarbone, this years back injury was too much for him. He withdrew from the Tour. Jan Ulrich has done well but was unable to keep up with Lance Armstrong when he started pushing up the mountains. He lost several minutes on both mountain stages, putting Lance almost out of his reach, at close to 7 minutes ahead of Jan Ullrich. He may not even get third. The surprise of the Tour has been Thomas Voeckler and Ivan Basso. Voeckler took a big lead in at the beginning of the Tour. Remember when I said it was to Armstrong advantage to let another rider defend the yellow, until he was ready to take over. Voeckler and his team proved worthy of holding the yellow, defending well and working hard. The surprise was in the Pyrenees Mountains. Voeckler proved to be a far better climber than anyone gave him credit for. While he did lose five minutes in each of the two mountain stages so far, he still holds a 22 second lead. That is likely to go away in the next mountain stage. Even if, by some miracle, he held the lead throughout the mountain stages, he is likely to lose a lot of time in the Time Trials. He has still provided excitement for the French, who have been without anything to shout about with the last few Tours. He has an outside chance of taking third overall. Ivan Basso stayed with Armstrong in the mountain stages. This propelled him into third, about a minute behind Armstrong. If all goes as it has, he will take second in the Tour. So the question last week has been answered. Did Armstrong push the prolog because he needed to, or because he was just that much better than everyone else? The answer is, he is just that much better than anyone else. - Fist de Yuma