[grunion]

i have found that the game is a lot more fun at 50+. you dont have to go all the way into the 70's to really start exploring, but in the 40's it's just too easy to die and a lot of stuff will agro you everywhere you go.

anyway i thought it might be interesting for people to see what they can look forward to when they level up

one day a couple friends (level 50-60) went to Castle Oztroja to try to kill some yagudos and make a little money off drops. they were easy to kill so we started training them and killing them off in groups. that led to us competing to see who could make the biggest train ...




i actually got so lagged out that i was able to run THROUGH the zone exit, and leave the map area:




i died of course - how could i cast a spell when i couldn't even zone? >.<

by the way, no bystanders were injured during this train

then a few days later i got a hankerin to explore the temple of uggalepith and see what a tonberry looked like. we were going to be doing summon avatar battles in a few days and i wanted to prepare for doing leviathan. also zilart M4 says to go there (although i'm not really sure what to do there). so i took an airship to kazham and rode a choco east and south to the temple.



it was pretty scary. most of it was easy prey to me at 57 but it was just me and a 51 DRG who i kept invisible the whole time because it was all decent challenge to him. a couple times he got agro and the damn tonberry used level II BLM spells and nearly killed us, even as easy prey!

i really wanted to know more about the area so i started asking all my friends and LS mates if they wanted to try zilart M4. after about 2 hours (6 of them were doing M12 and someone didnt have the quest so we had to wait for them to warp out, get the quest, walk all the way back in - long walk! - fight the shadow lord, go to norg, talk to gilgamesh, go to kazham, then come to the temple! and someone went back to kazham before they talked to gilgamesh so they had to go BACK to norg again!) we finally headed into the temple. we heard some things from a couple more experienced players that as you kill tonberries, you build up a hate counter so they do more and more damage. we were pretty scared to even kill 1! but after we had 12 people, we just started killing them, hardly thinking of the hate building (but worried, in the back of our minds). we didn't really know what to do but a JP player i invited at the last minute said we needed 4 lanterns at I-10. so we tried to find I-10. a few ton's dropped tonberry lanterns so i thought we would be set getting the 4. however, someone else said they had to be special rare/ex lanterns, which are dropped by Bonze, a difficult NM, and someone else said that the lanterns would make 3 NMs pop that were hard to a pt of 65s (and we were mostly level 60) so after about 2-3 hours of exploring and killing stuff (and being scared to death of the Manipulator), we called it a night.



then a few days later we started doing summoner battles!

on the way to garuda you have to pass a dozen very high level mean looking nasties:



and on the way to ifrit you have to go through ifrit's cauldron, which is VERY scary and dangerous (the first time through, everyone died. i died from a bat in 2 hits, 400 dmg each).



here's some pics from the battles with ifrit and ramuh






i helped with someone's BLM AF2 and we had to go into castle vahzl. it was my first time there - another very scary place >.< full of easy or dc demons but there was SO much agro everywhere, and i'm just a taru bard so i die pretty fast. here's a tricky spot where you have to fall into a pit with T and VT demons (at level 57). someone thought invis was enough and went in without sneak. they killed him right away fortunately we had a BLM who tractored him into a hallway where we raised him and kept going. you have to kill one of these to get a rare/ex item for the BLM af.



i also wanted to see behemoth, so every few hours i would type

/sea "Behemoth's Dominion"

and wait to see if a lot of people were there. one time there were 30 people there, all anon! i told my LS and we ran to see the battle. we got there when it died and missed the fight, but since it pops every 24-25 hours, we knew when to come back so the next day we were ready and when the time came we were already on the way. here's some pics of behemoth up close and personal




there was one other thing i really wanted to see this week: Ro'Mauve, the hall of the gods, Ru'Aun gardens, and some other zones i had heard about. i didn't know anything about them except that 1) they were very high level and related to later missions and 2) they were connected to the ZiTah sanctuary. i changed to 38WHM/19BLM so i could sneak in and warp out and got on a choco and headed that way ...

the route through zi'tah was tougher than normal because once you head north there's a lot of higher level stuff. fortunately i was on a choco so i ran past all the coerls and undead...

when i zoned into ro'mauve i saw a cermet expanse with layers and stairs, and lots of IT dancing weapons roaming around. i was pretty nervous but i put sneak/invis on and started running. i did have a map (bought in mhaura) so i knew roughly where to go. i went left, then all the way right, then left up some stairs and i was at the zone! i made it all on ONE sneak/invis! amazing! at the top are a lot of robots guarding the hall of the gods and a ??? that didn't do anything for me




i headed inside to check out the hall of the gods



there were no monsters but it was a dead end for me (didn't have whatever you need to open the gate at the other end) so i warped out.

that's the end of my adventures this week! next week i hope to get windurst mission 6-2 done (BCNM against 4 yagudos). i dont really know what areas are left ot explore except maybe bostaineux obliette, onzozo labyrinth, the 10th floor of delfkutt's tower, and rancor's den, but i'm scared to go to them :D

[MurphyMurf]

Hey grunion, nice pics,
too bad team ghetto is no more
Murphy Cloud:

Murphymurf

[grunion]

hey murf! a lot of us went to pinkcandy. just ask when i am on (12+ hours/day) and i'll be very happy to give you a pearl

[Bagel]

What level are you? im 59 and a whole bunch of my Jp friends keep telling me im to low to get the summons, i want them really bad but im supposedly to low..=(

[grunion]

we had 58-61 whm, whm, blm, blm, brd, and 62 pld and won almost every time. i haven't tried it with drg though so i dont know how that would work

[Bagel]

Then they must not be as hard as people say, cool. Theres hope for me yet. =)

[TMan]

Great stuffs.

[LunarGaze]

I want to explore areas too but i am too low lvl. I found Ro'Meave on accident looking for Boyada Moss. I still haven't seen the northern lands. I built up the guts to enter the zone of Behemoth's Dominion and quickly turned around and left Cool adventures though ^^ Maybe we drgs are good for someting avatar battles would be fun. Most people don't want us for an BCNM's ; ;

[grunion]

i've beaten BCNM40 giddeus with DRG both times. drg are also great from killing wyverns at high levels - any HNM LS would be lucky to have 2- DRGs to kill guivre, bune, fafnir, and wyverns in the cauldron.

[LunarGaze]

I wish some of the people in my LS would believe me when i say we can help in BCNM and HNM. They aren't high enough lvl for fight anyone of the dragons yet or wyverns in Ifrit's Cauldron hopefully they will see.

[Tipsy]

Hey LunarGaze do you know anyone else here thats on Seraph besides you and me?

[LunarGaze]

Yeah they are some i just forgot there forum names. Penazure and Raya stop by here from time to time along with some other higher lvl people. The seraph forum will have more people from seraph in it.