Misery loves company....
I might as well speak of my weekend in Norrath as well.
Like many others, I am a harbinger of ill news.
*Background Info*
The past week has been very busy for me. Work and other
stuff kept me from playing much the whole week. Did
have time to play an hour a day and managed to finish
the Glowing Stein quest for a friend by Thursday.
Finally, I get some time to play seriously on Saturday
and Sunday.
*End Background Info*
Saturday
Log on slight before noon EST. Figure it's a Saturday,
and most of my friends should be on. Do a /who all
friends and all I see is a level 23 enchanter friend
of mine (I'm level 33). He's doing the Glowing Stein
quest. I'm heading to Highkeep to see if I can find a
group. No luck there. Oh well. Head over to Freeport,
get a boat ride and off to Unrest. Pretty dead. Another
full group is camping the basement. Someone starts a
huge train, I run to the zone, take on the unrest noble
and his pet. With some help, I kill him and get a
bloodstained mantle. Not too bad. No group but at least
a mantle. I thank the people that help me and I'm off
to Mistmoore to see if I can get a group. No luck there
either. One or two groups there, but too low to do the
graveyard. Mainly picking off initiates and grinning
gargoyles. Finally find a group with a level 31 cleric
and a 29 druid. Not willing to take chances, they want
to stay outside the graveyard. Fine with me. I stick
around helping them kill stuff that is mostly green to
me. Get one or two kills that give me exp. Ho hum
pretty boring. Get dropped. Oh well. Not exactly doing
well anyway. Decide to take a break, watch some TV and
have some food. Play Freecell a little and decide to
log on again. This time a good friend of mine, Level 35
Paladin, Talhkis is on. Meet him in the graveyard in
Mistmoore. Get a decent group going and start getting
a bit of exp. But things were going slow, so we decide
to meet another friend in West Commons and head to Sol
A. So we arrive in Sol A and head towards the King area
but we get lost some. But it's ok. We're still getting
kills and pretty decent exp so we're not complaining.
However, all this time after I left Mistmoore I've been
having packetloss of over 50% consistently. I was
comtemplating logging and calling it a night but since
we were doing fine I decided to stay. Unfortunately,
one runner got away and came back with friends. I bit
it. There was so much packetloss when I died that I
didn't get the msg that I was slain by some goblin but
rather Pain and his twin Suffering strikes me (must be
monks. Pesty monks) but misses and I died. Bound in
Greater Fay. No problem. Level 31 cleric in my party
revives me. Decided to cut the losses before it gets
worse and log. Net experience gain for the day - Zero.
On the whole not too bad a day but far from a good one.
Sunday
Oh how I wished I never even logged. Log on and see a
friend I haven't seen in a while. A level 29 monk
(pesty monk). Group with him a little and again help
him clear some stuff. Green to me but blue to him so I
don't really mind. Finally he gets a level 25 druid to
join us. So we try to make our way to the Foreman's
room. Packetloss is fine now so I said sure. Invis our way past most of
the goblins that were green to me.
Sitting around waiting for one more person to join us
so we can try the Captain room since we found out that
the foreman room was being camped by someone else. Just
chit chatting and all of a sudden I turn around and a
huge Flame goblin train is on my back. I run as fast as
I can but I bite it. Still bound in GFay. Ouch. This
time no cleric. Well, turns out my friend's guildmate
a level 30 druid is online and in Greater Fay. Get a
group teleport to West Commons. Invite this druid to
join us in Sol A. She does. So now we have a level 29
monk, a level 25 druid, a level 30 druid, a level 32
warrior and me, a level 33 bard. Pretty good group.
Figure the captain room shouldn't be a problem.
Shouldn't have a problem regaining the exp I lost from
getting trained on. Well make my way back and loot my
corpse. Go back to the zone line to regroup and we pick
up another level 33 bard to complete the group. So we
try to work our way back. As I was crawling through the
hole in the wall, my computer drops a frame. Next thing
I know everything around me is red and I'm taking 39
damage every so often. Ouch, lava. Try to swim around
and find a way out. Can't, swim to a place where I know
where I am and die. Welcome back to GFay. Lvl 30 druid
comes pick me up and this time I get myself bound to
Freeport (I'm too used to grouping with a level 29 and
up cleric). Run back and get my corpse with levitate
song. By this time I'm kind of frustrated... but I push
on. We make our way to the captain room. Kill the
elementals (cancel their dmg shield and they are
actually pretty easy to kill and good exp). Then we
clear the other room. So far so good. Maybe all this
dying will soon pay off. Since I knew the area the best
in my group, I pull. I knew I was going to pull a big
group right when I clear the area before the captain
room. No problem. Done it a lot of times before. Have
a pull of 6 or so. I nod (and I noticed I nod more than
4 but who knows... not sure). We're working on the
flame goblin wizard. Monk says cancel magic the dmg
shield this wizard has and nuke it as fast as the group
can. Was kind of puzzled by why he told the group to do
that since the wizard dmg shield does only 2 dmg and
this wizard was hitting us with AE spells that really
don't do that much. However the fight was going well
and I got overconfident and didn't overrule that
command. So our lvl 30 druid wasted all her mana nuking
the 2 wizards and one shaman. Leaving us to deal with
one inferno and 2 flame goblins (i think). By this time
I've taken a significant amt of damage so I take myself
out of combat for a bit and sing healing song. Two
runners go. Uh oh. I immediately order evac. Druid
doesn't have enough mana for succor. Goblins come back
with friends. I bite it first again. This time party
casualties are high. All except the monk (feigned) and
one druid die. Get corpse and decide to log. All this
time I was having a minor argument/discussion with the
other bard in the party about nod vs charm. I prefer
nod over charm, although I can see the use of charm.
However, in a party I find nod so much more useful
than charm. The other bard insist that nod is inviting
death to the person singing it (however it seems he had
no problems with me singing it and keeping other alive)
. I disagreed but oh well. On the whole totally disappointed with the
day and felt that a lot of
miscommunication led to lots of unnecessary dieing and
difficulties. Sigh......
That sums up my terrible EQ weekend. Taught me a valuable lesson
though, one of the most valuable thing
you can have in EQ (more than any piece of equipment in the game) is a
party of people that you can group with
and group well with (communicate and trust each other).
Well I'm looking forward to the next weekend and this time I hope I can
group up with all the people I usual group with. Oh, have a wedding to
attend in Norrath too.
Anyway, to close things, I leave everyone with this question (which is
somewhat unfair since each song has its own merits (well almost all
songs)):
Lullaby/Nod vs Charm in a group.
Darrian Ashoka
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