Everquest Southern Armada Raids Week Twenty

07/07/03 Week Twenty

This weeks images are a bit larger than normal. They are all still under 20K and the same size as usual , but it was a flagging night, so I tried to get decent close ups of stuff. Apologies to those on Dial-Up. First up, a quote from group chat a week or so ago. We were forming up to venture into CODa and Elly got a little frustrated with his 2nd PC's logon time.

For those who (Like me) need glasses.
Ellyrion tells the group: "My 2nd PC is slow as fuck"
Metalex tells the group: "upgrade"
Ellyrion tells the group: "I've seen old ppl fuck faster"
Caniella tells the group: "I really don't want to think about that"

I have to agree Cani, I really don't, but it gets quote of the month from me!!.

Well last night was an adventure!. We had examples of Southern Armada at our best and at (from what I have seen so far) our worst, sometimes at the same time. First up. Shei Vinitras. Flawless kill. I LOVE running all the way through Akheva Ruins and just AOEing all the trash on the way.

Next up Agnarr!!. WOOT a flagging, a flagging!. So we form up outside BOT in the courtyard. Someone manages to aggro the statue's. Not sure how that happened but we quickly dealt with them and started to move in. Geno DA's in and pulls the trash out from zone, we deal with the Portals and adds and turn on Evynd Firestorm. It was a bit messy and at one point I seriously thought we were going to wipe. We had adds all over the place, uncontrolled, Pooby down, Hill down, Nym tanking the Named, healers going down. We brought it back under control and I hoped that would going to be the shake down of the night and it would be nice and smooth after that.

Evynd Firestorm

So we take down the first level of the tower and rez, rebuff ready for the second. Geno DA's in to pull trash away again and goes down!. Pooby is on the named and keeping it entertained, CH chain is flowing nicely. 30 casters are standing there, thumbs up their butts looking for a target, no Second Assist!!. I am standing around ready to unleash some serious unpleasantness, I'm FM and can see at least 3 targets that the Chanters have under control and cant do nada!

It got sorted, Pallies stepped up and we rapidly took out the whirly stone thingies and started on the named. This is a fun kill. The AE's are so nasty that its really a ranged fight. So with the target designated, Pooby keeping aggro I just chain dotted the hell out of him, ended the fight at about 30% mana.

Image shamelessly Stolen from Illia's cause I didn't manage to get a good one.
Emmerick Skyfury

We got a "well done, as flawless a kill as I have ever seen" from Geno!!!!. Wow!. Finally we make it to Agnarr's floor. Everybody knows what to do, we are fully buffed, we are pumped from the last couple of fights, Geno calls it and we Engage!. Of course it all goes completely tits up. Pooby down, Cani and Trundle down, Geno down, confusion over Second Assist calls and targets, most of the Rangers and Druids kiting Agnarr down, Wizzie's down, half the Necro's down. We have 4-5 uncontrolled Adds running amok inside the raid, Agnarr wont stay controlled and Hilly and Panolen are doing a fucking beautiful job kiting him.

I looked up and less than a third of the raid is still standing, bodies everywhere, Agnarr rampaging, adds just dropping people in one round all over the place. We are fucked. Then, the Guild took a collective deep breath, dug deep and recovered. This is to me the difference between a Guild and a Raiding Guild. We may only raid 2-3 times a week, but nothing gets in our way. Thats our reputation. We are the little guild that does more with less. The only difference now is we arent so little. People stepped up to do their jobs, thought outside the box and just said to themselves "This is NOT going to beat me". Many many guilds would have just taken the wipe at this point or had somebody do something stupid and complete the wipe. Not Southern Armada.

I was dragging (trying to, consent damnit), Combat rezzing started, Necro's are dumping to Clerics and throwing out Dots and Nukes as the off tanks got the Adds under control, Malina did an absolutely fantastic job keeping the named Giant out of the way, Panolen kept Agnarr occupied until Bilb (after his Rez) could get his AA boosted root on him and fix him in position.

Slowly we dragged ourselves back from a wipe, toon by toon we came back, until we had a room clear of Adds and Portals, Agnarr rooted against one wall and a fully rezzed and ready to go Raid. I couldn't believe it. I was fully stunned, that was a better feeling than dropping Ryd'dar the first time, that was Southern Armada in action. Kez was right to stop recruiting after all the guys from Xev came across, to allow everyone time to get to know one another. If last night was anything to go by, I would say the shakedown is nearly complete and SA is close to being ready for Rallos. Having said that, we should never have gotten that close to a wipe in the first place. No ones fault. Geno's strats were perfect. I think with Kez away and others having a rest, the few left in the officer corps are just about stretched to the limit. Once we were recovered however, Agnarr didn't even rate a blip on our radar. He is another one who spawns adds as his health drops :

Ekil Thundercall

The final add is Hibdin Cyclone and he is apparently a major pain, un-slowable and a massive damage output. Geno tanked him and we just blew him away.

Hibdin Cyclone

Finally the swine we were there for, Agnarr the Storm Lord. Ganked.

So we all ran upstairs to see Karana. It really is a kind of a cruel joke on the part of SOE to make the most hated God in the game, be the one you have to rescue. I was so looking forward to killing Karana for all the times I spent lost on his Plain's or just going round and round in circles in his damn rain.

This week we have a patch Wednesday night and a raid Thursday night so the pickings should be good! Well last week's Raids sucked ass in the end. Patch Wednesday was delayed to Thursday, so the raid was delayed to Friday. Then of course SOE fucked up the patch and had to emergency patch on the Friday. By the time the servers came up I was asleep. So sometime in the week I went along and helped drop Trakanon again and that was about it for raiding this week.

Everquest Southern Armada Raids Week Nineteen

03/07/03 Week Nineteen

Tuesday night's raid was pretty short and sweet for me. After Saryrn I saw the call for Tallon Zek when my logout countdown was at about 10 seconds. Too Late!. I was nearly out and absolutely buggered so I left it and went to bed. First up on Tuesday I did my little run into Crypt of Decay to check if Paffa was up. I'm sure there is some nasty see invis MOB in the little room just outside his lair, because my invis drops or gets broken every time I make that damn run. Well he was up and very kindly the officers decided he was the nights warm up.

This time I waited to take my Screen shot and got a view of the other side of Paffa's head. This is to prove that he DOES in fact have a second ear that could potentially drop an earring. *Sigh* but not this time. We even had Mall sit the fight out because the only time an Earring has dropped was when he wasn't there. Didn't work.

Overlord Banord (1/30) Paffa

I get my hopes up every damn time. Its not even so much that I want one, which I do, don't get me wrong, I just want him to drop ONE! So after yet another disappointment, we headed out to the Plane of Torment, to hit Saryrn again. Its seems to be something of a Southern Armada tradition, that, beyond flagging requirements, we always hit a tough MOB at least twice, just to prove the first one wasn't a fluke. Not that Saryrn is a tough MOB, she's not. But clearing all the crap to get to her is a pain in the ass. If you have never done this kill, you basically have 1-2 hours of Trash clearing and 4 Named MOBs to kill before you get to Saryrn's room. Killing her is the easy bit.

Servant of Saryrn

Now I think I actually got screenshots of all the named's and in order this time. First up is the Fleshgrinder. Now forgive me if I am wrong, but surely if you are designing an encounter you start with the slightly easier MOBs and move up to the hard ones in a sort of semi logical progression?. Nope, not if you are SOE, lets put the 1k quadding, AE Rampaging, 100K HP MOB at the start of the run!!. Ah well I guess it sorts out whether you should even be attempting the kill.

Salczek the Fleshgrinder

Next up (I think) comes Ta`Grusch the Abomination. Another huge damage output MOB.

Now in front of that big ugly ass MOB which is pumping out enough damage to drop an Old World God, stands Pooby. In a lot of cases all that stands between us and a wipe, is the Poobinator and the dedication and Skill of the SA Cleric team. /BIG BOW to you guys!. One of these days Pooby will make the magical 10k mark, oh yes he will!

Then comes the Acolyte, a fun fight cause of all the adds. If your CC team isn't on to it, even if you can survive the previous two mobs, this guy will get you every time.

The Acolyte of Affliction

Another "spawn lots of MOBs as my health drops" Boss. Again, you better have damn good crowd control for this, one downed Chanty can mean 20+ adds in the middle of your raid. I still think its a bit of a boring Model though.

Maareq the Prophet

Next, and last before Saryrn's room is The Keeper of Sorrows. Now this is a MOB I really don't get. You make it through all the other very tough MOB's, requiring CC, healing, high DPS etc etc, you get to this guy, who is the last thing in your way and he's a Gimp. Straight up and down Tank fight. Odd.

The Keeper of Sorrows

Then you get to the good bit. I like this fight. It needs everybody to be on their game. Everyone has to be clear about what they are doing, where they are placed, what will happen next and the pace and speed of Saryrn's death. We lost one player this time. 2 Kills, one death, that's not half bad.

She knows we are coming, its all just bluster....

Saryrn has been Poobied.

A couple of days ago I was looking through Allakhazam's (As you do) and I noticed this. Now I can only speak as a Necro (I have played a tank to the 50's but that don't count) and personally that's one of those items that just makes me go all weak at the knee's. If it had STA on it as well I would have started to drool at my desk. This run through Saryrn was kind enough to drop it for us. To be honest I am very happy Mallee won it. I think the officers made a good call, and damn that job has to suck, Grats Mall, that is an Awesome Earring :)

I have to say, the more we crawl through the Mid-Upper Tiers of the Planes of Power, the more I am enjoying it. Every encounter, or series of them, has a different flavor. Its obvious (or at least it seems so to me, maybe I am wrong) that they are training Guilds towards an end. As you progress through the planes the fights get longer, they require more and more "combined arms" co-ordination and more and more dedication from the players than ever before. I think the designers are essentially trying to weed out the "lesser" or "weaker" guilds with these progressive encounters. Sure you can clear NToV, but can you drop a BOT Tower Boss?, Terris Thule?, Grummus?, or if you can kill those, can you step up to Rydda`Dar?, can you concentrate and co-ordinate your people long enough to drop Bertoxxulous?, finally, can you put everything you have learned together and kill the Big Bad (as Buffy would say) and kill Rallos Zek the Warlord.

I have seen a lot of talk and discussion lately about the next series of "EQ Killers" on the horizon. Personally, I have put a shit load of time and effort into this game and I am not going anywhere till I can say I "beat" it. I have been playing 4+ years and now I am getting this close to EndGame there is no way I am leaving. I want to see POTime, I want to drop the Rathe Council, I want to break the 3k HP mark on Ulaa. There is still a lot to do and see.

I have also seen a lot of bitching and whining by the Uber Guilds about how the end game "sucks" and there is "nothing" after it. Well sorry but getting to be an "Uber Guild" means one thing, you finish the game earlier and you have a lot of time waiting around for the next expansion. You get bragging rights cause you were first and you get to tell the rest of us we suck. If you don't like it, then stop playing 60 hours a week. Me personally, I still enjoy EQ and I have still got a lot of this game to see. Having zoned into and done a little hunting in Sol Ro's Tower I have to say I am looking forward to the rest of the zones. The design of that zone, the "Look and Feel" of it are fantastic!. I cant wait to see POFire and POWater.

Friday
Night. Fucking Overlord Banord 1/31 "Necro's can Suck my Ass" Paffa is first target. I went LD (oh what a surprise) as we engaged so no pic. He still didn't drop an earring. Bastard. Next up was a run to my favorite Zone. I always do the port down to The Great Divide and then run through Kael Drakkal to the Wakening Lands side. Its a lot faster than waiting for a port in POK. So we form up, buff up and the pulls start. We just about have this down to a fine art at this point. I think we could almost bring everything between the pull spot and the Statue and just AOE it.

Statue pulled....

shortly to die...

Once again the Statue came with two or three friends and once again the off tanks stepped up and nailed them.

The Idol of Rallos Zek

The Avatar of War

Then it was a quick run to Halls of Honor for more backflagging. We set up for the Villager Trial fast, kicked it off and spanked it. We absolutely blew through about 20 level 60+ Named Mobs without even pausing for breath.

One of many

Then it was time for our old Nemesis Rydda`Dar. This Dragon, that once gave us so many problems, went down like Pam on Tommy.

He's a Pussy really..

Then it was time for the big boy of the night. A quick run up to the Temple of Marr and the Lord Mithaniel Marr. Now once again this is a major crawl through miles and miles of Zone Yard Trash. However the yard trash here looks pretty cool. Some people think that these MOBs are doggies (Probably Canterbury fans) . I personally think they look like pussy cats. Level 64, hit like a freight train, pussy cats. They look like they should be curled up and asleep at the foot of my bed, purring and keeping my feet warm.

Once you clear through them you get the fun of killing off a couple of named's. If the pussy cats hit like freight trains the named hit like having a small moon dropped on you. Get it wrong and you can have a wee oops!. The named's died, but so did a lot of us.

Oops!.

Finally we were in place and it was time to go. The Monks were busy separating out Lord Marr from his various body guards. The biggest and nastiest of which is an overblown froggie model called Ralthazor, Champion of Marr. Now why didn't they use a new froggie model?. The new froggies are all followers of Marr, the old froggies from Guk (same as this model) are not.

Killing Ralthazor isn't hard, separating him from his guards is. The pull team did their usual flawless job and Ralthazor came alone. Unfortunately, during the maneuvering to separate Marr from his remaining body guards someone went LD, some funny aggro happened and we got Mith Marr and 3 of his friends.

That's basically another oops pic. We attempted to recover in place and Geno and Attann did a brilliant job of playing Tag with the pussy cats to keep them aggro'd on the far side of the room. It would have worked as well if two of them hadn't warped over to our corner and wiped the clerics and few tanks we had up by that time. Ah well chalk that one up to experience and bad luck. At that point it was close to 2:00am and time for sleep. I don't think anything else was hit that night as a lot of people were starting to log at that point.

But the following night I logged on with the hope we would get a chance at another Raid. Sure enough our old friend Seru was up. Everyone gathers in POK for the Port to Sanctus Seru and start the fight in to him. Once again he was waiting with his back to us. What I want to know is how he ever managed to Challenge the Emperor. He is always looking the wrong way.

He cant be the sharpest knife in the drawer.

Another not so good fight. He aggro'd to the wrong spot on pull, wipe went half the Casters and Clerics. We struggled on for a couple of minutes before the call was taken to camp. We reformed, pulled and ganked flawlessly.

Lord Inquisitor Seru

That was pretty much it for Friday. Just a simple quite kill. Saturday was July 4th in the USA so Unity weren't really up to a lot. I managed to tag along with Cani and a couple of Non-USA Unity chaps and did a bit of killing for XP in the Halls of Honor.

Nevor Jikman

I also managed to tag along on a mini run to Old Sebilis to drop the Undead dragon Lord Trakanon. Now Trak may be well and truly old school EQ but I have never killed him, or even ventured that deeply into Sebilis. So about one and half groups of us formed up in Seb and started to fight our way in. It went pretty simply actually. Fight down to him, separate out his protectors.

and then a fairly simple Zerg Rush at him. Dead Dragon and one more Dragon ticked off the kill list!!.

Trakanon

He dropped a couple of BP's neither of which I won (I was hoping for the Cobalt BP for my nasty Warrior Twink) and we all ported out and went our separate ways, another Dragon trashed. I did manage to be awarded a Trak Tooth, so I guess I should start my Veeshans Peak Key quest!.

Everquest Southern Armada Raids Week Eighteen

24/06/03 Week Eighteen
Well since I missed out on the raid on Friday night I tried to join up with Unity on Saturday and Sunday for a couple of their Raids. First off, while waiting for the bulk of Unity to Logon we headed up to the Bastion of Thunder for all the named's we could fit in. Turns out Talionis was already clearing most of the Tower Bosses as we got there so the only one up was Brynju Thunderclap. Unity dropped him pretty promptly.

Brynu Thunderclap

After that they decided to attempt the Rallos Zek encounter in the Plane of Tactic's. Now this is one of the big ones. This is the roadblock on the way to Elementals for almost every guild in the game. If you can make it past Rallos, nothing short of the Elemental Planes Bosses is going to stop you. Unity has had numerous attempts at him but this was the first one I managed to tag along on. First up you have to kill a bunch of Yard trash, but there are a couple of named triggers you have to Memblur/Mez and Pull with you as you move.

Decorin Berik

Once you are in the right spot (The beginning of the Tallon Zek Encounter) you have then kill the triggers as fast as you can to spawn TZ. I hate this bastard. Once again I completely failed to survive and this time all I did was nuke!, actually the MT went down just as casters started landing Nukes and they pulled aggro. One TZ arrow amongst the casters and we were all dead.

Tallon Zek

We reformed and were about to venture back in when I got a tell from a guildie to come and help him out. So, a Unity raid may be fun but a guildie comes first. So off to Cazic Thule for a little casual Lizard Slaughter. After killing off a few named in CT I checked with the raid. Unity were deep inside Tactics and there was really no re-joining them. So the little group I was in headed off to do a bit of Shard farming for the Vex Thal key.

Late Sunday I also joined in dropping a couple of named in Bastion of Thunder. Goddamn I love Pallies, if ya cant get a Warrior, a Pally or SK will do just as nicely!.

Laef Windfall

Hreider Lynhillig

That was about it for the weekend.The GF has a really savage flu so I was able to be online a lot longer than I normally would on Sunday. This meant a lot more Vex Thal Shard farmage was possible and I managed to collect the last few pieces of my Key!.Monday and Tuesday were called as the raids for this week, mainly because we were hoping for a shot at the Emperor and he was due to pop at that point. So Monday I logged in and as usual we took a shot at Paffa in Crypt Of Decay while waiting for everyone else to arrive. We have killed him an average 1.5 times a week for 18 weeks. That's 27 kills. We have had 1 earring drop. A 1/27+ ratio, come on SOE, don't you think that's a LITTLE rare even for an earring that nice?.

Banord Paffa

Next up was a little Backflagging. Terris Thule is actually a fun fight and I quite enjoy it, but this is getting to be a pain in the ass and I am beginning to feel the pain of the longer term members. The flagging system was a great concept but I really wish they had thought a little harder with how they implemented it. Ah well, a necessary evil because we need every warm body we can summon for the Elemental Planes!. So off to the the Bitch Goddess of Nightmares house to see what's under her skirt.

Terris Thule waiting for us...

She had a wee accident, fell down and hurt herself *Sad*

Then Kez called Bert!. WOOT!. I Missed Bert last week due to connection problems, so I was really looking forward to this!. Back to the Crypt of Decay, formed up and started pulling. Now I didn't get a lot of good screen shots of this one as the event is a hard and fast one. I spent most of it facing a wall and running everything through my hot key bank. /Assist Genosin, /Cast undead Nuke and /Mana Dump. The DPS in the guild now is massive.

My Nuke is a 5 second cast and often I had to interrupt as the mob was dead before I could land it. I
did manage to get a few very basic screens.

Knight Of Decay

Basically this is a two hour running fight. You kill the trigger Mobs and you have 2 hours to clear 12 Named Kings and finally Bert. If you don't do it inside 2 hours Bert despawns. Each King has his/its own peculiarities you have to contend with and deal with. The pulling was a little iffy in some places as the monks had never done this event before so they were a little unsure of the "tricks" of it. Next time they will nail it I am damn sure. We have the best pulling team on Prexus bar no-one.

I managed to go LD immediately after the 12th King was killed but was lucky enough to get back in and be able to join the raid. Finally we pulled and killed Bert. Bert is cool, I loaded him up with all the DoT's I possibly could and then started Nuking!. Wow, one more flag out of the way. I am one Flag (Saryn Kill) from Sol Ro's Tower!! and an additional 2 flags from Elementals (Agnarr the Storm Lord and Rallos Zek the Warlord).

Bertoxxulous Dead

I am further along in the game than I ever thought I would be. It kind of stuns me sometimes to be honest. After 4 years of playing and effort I am actually at the point in the game where I want to be. I have now seen and taken part in content that maybe 5% of the player base ever will. So with Bert downed (and 15 minutes to spare) and the PhatLewtz handed out, people were starting to log. I was considering it, after all it was close to 1.00am my time. Then it came. The call I have been waiting to see since Luclin was released. "The Emperor Ssraeshza is up!, get to the Temple.

" Anyone who considers themselves even vaguely serious about EQ starts to drool when you say that name. It's the "coming of age Mob" for any guild. It's not so much about killing him, which in the age of level 65's and Elemental Armour and items, really isn't that hard for a lot of guilds. It's about having the dedication to get the keys. It's about racing every other Emp capable guild to get to him. For a long time he was the be all and end all. Sure there was Vex Thal after him, but beating him was the big one. Kez then says "90 Minutes tops for the Kill". I should know better by now *sigh*.

When Kez gets his teeth into something, nothing makes him let go. Kez's relation to time is a lot like that of the infamous "Microsoft Minute". One Minute in Kez land, can equal hours in the real
world.

So of course there is no way in hell I'm going to log at this point. We stopped off at the third floor to kill the Named Commanders to pick up 3 final pieces for people and then zoned in. I Love that Message "The key to the throne Room to the Emperor of Ssraeshza has been added to your Keyring" WOOT!. Zone in and run into the Emperors Room. Its a really cool looking room, with all the colored lights and runes on the walls.

The trick to this fight is not only the Bane weapons you need to be able to even damage the Emperor, its the tight and effective Crowd Control and healing to keep his bodyguards in order. We buffed up, got ready and pulled the Blood of Ssraeshza. 6 mates came with him and with heroic effort the Crowd Control Team got them all under control and started on The Blood himself.

Blood of Ssraeshza

Engage!

Blood snuffed it fast and everyone ran to the Emperor. He popped a little sooner than expected and it was touch and go there for a while, but thanks to damn quick reactions from a couple of the raid force (Go Rangers!) and brilliant heal management we got him back under control and the Necs started to lay in the DoT's hard.

Damn this is a long ass fight. But considering we had 41 people and only 3 Bane weapons we did Brilliantly!.

Dead Fat Snake Bastard

I logged off at about 4:00am. I felt really, really bad when I got up at 6:30am to go to work after about 15 minutes sleep. But it doesn't matter, that's one more item ticked off the EQ wish list!. I also managed to be one of the people who got a Rift from the Emperor. So on Tuesday evening this week I managed (with the help of several people, and big thanks to all of them!!) to finish my Key to the zone of Vex Thal, and hopefully one of these days Southern Armada will zone in there en masse and trash the place.

Now, last week after SOE fucked up the graphics animation patch (Surprise, Surprise) my graphics started to look seriously bizarre. I was seeing some very very bizarre skins.

Ometiklan
(High elf Pally)

PinkPower Ranger

Lyrique

Random Weirdness

And just for laughs, here is a couple of pics of me and My Horsie!! Not only is he pretty, he's the fastest thing in the Game with the exception of a level 65 Bard with a focus item. Don't I look Fabulous!

Tuesday we had a patch. Everyone decided to logon after the patch and I believe they dropped Lord Mithaniel Marr. However, after the effort on Monday night, and one hours sleep, followed by a ten hour day there was just no way. So I logged just before the patch and was asleep before my head hit the pillow. Wednesday we managed another mini raid. Lord Seru was up so we formed up for the hit in Plane Of Knowledge and gated in to Sanctus Seru . Lord Seru was in his usual position, facing completely the wrong way while we snuck in behind him.

Lord Inquisitor Seru

First time round we lost the main tank, the casters immediately gained aggro (as we do when there are 6 Necro's dotting for over 1k per tick) and he charged us. The tanks managed to gain aggro back but by then we had lost about 1/3rd of the raid force. So we called it a fail, logged a cleric or two and took the wipe. Logged back in and the second run was absolutely flawless. In fact, I think he went down even faster than he usually does.

That was the end of Friday night. I gated and logged as soon as he went down. I had promised the GF a 20 Minute kill before the first wipe. So in the end I was about an hour later logging than I had anticipated. Much GF faction farming has to be done.

Next day I joined the good folks over at Unity for an attempt to grab a key for access to Saryrn. I was a bit late so I had to run up to join the raid in the Plane of Torment. I was hoping Unity were also going to take a run at Saryrn herself after the key raid but it wasn't to be. Ah well, I got to see a whole section of the zone I had never been to. To cut a long story short, you have to travel through a nasty Boss MoB's stomach's to be able to finally kill him and get yourself a key. EWWWW.

The MoB's look really cool though as you travel through the stomachs. Unity did the whole script fast and clean.

A Flayed Horror

Unfortunately the final part of the event was bugged and despite the valiant efforts of the 14 people who actually ended up ported to the right spot, we couldn't quite take the final guy down. So I gated out after the Rez and went and did a little farming in Sebilis.Later on Saturday afternoon the officers sorted another pickup raid. Ellyrion and Servalan logged in, started organizing, and we all headed over to the Crypt of Decay. Once again Overlord Banord Paffa (1/28) has proven to have no ears. He's got about 10 backs, 10 hands and 7 faces but only one damn ear.

Earless Fat Bastard

One of these days that fat bastard is actually going to drop an Earring. Simultaneously 9 Necro's around the world will have heart attacks in sheer surprise and it will end up rotting. After Paffa went down there were more and more SA people logging in. So we decided we had enough for a hit on Saryrn, so everyone headed across to The Plane of Torment. We also had enough people who didn't get the Dream Sequence key the last time that we decided to do the whole thing again. The toughest part of this kill (IMHO) is not so much the Named kills, its clearing all the crap to get to the Named's.

Boruk Tormentor

Kaniz Tormentor

I managed to get some actual Shots of the Named's this time, and I even think they are vaguely in order.

The Acolyte of Affliction

Ta`Grusch the Abomination

There was Salczek the Fleshgrinder in there somewhere as well. You fight your way through all of those and a bazillion tons of Yard Trash to get to:

Maareq the Prophet

He is a pretty nondescript Human model type who basically stands there and gets ganked. He's a lot like the guy in the Caprin event that I never get to see. I cast on him from another room and that's it. So anyway, he goes down, we all pile under the Cage and port up to the final guys room. The Keeper of Sorrows. I find this kind of a weird fight in that a lot of the MoB's you have to face on the way to the Keeper are quite hard, but the Keeper himself is really a very easy, straight up and down tank fight. Not a lot to him.

The Keeper goes down, we all say our piece to the Flag guy and get ported back to Saryrn's room. Finally!, the Arch Bitch herself!. Makes Terris Thule look like a well behaved church going type!.

Saryrn waiting...

After telling her that Terris Thule is cuter...

Flawless

A Flawless kill it was. We didn't lose a single person, not even the Ninja Turtle Wannabe, tho we did try to get him killed by aggroing Sorrowsong too early and trying to drag him over to where the casters were so he could cast Silence on us. But all in all, a fun fight, the Chick MoB's in EQ seem to have this thing about spawning add's to help them. Now I know Rallos Zek does this as well. My question is this, is Rallos really a chick in Disguise?.

Of course the best part of this was a new Flag! After we all gated/ported out of Torment we all started running around fixing up flags. I had a couple of PreFlags I hadn't completed and it took much running between the Library, the Seer and Tranquility before I managed to get it all fixed up. Course the first thing I did was head over and zone into the Tower of Solusek Ro. This is a COOL looking zone and it is huge.

Didn't get much else done as it was getting on for quite late. So I gated out and went to bed. The next day I managed to get online a bit as I was sick so I was "allowed" a bit of extra time to play. There were a couple of people already in Sol's Tower, so I sent them a tell and headed over to see what the zone was like for XP. I have to say, wow. This is definitely my new home. 2-5% XP per kill in a full group killing the entry MoB's.

A Protector of Ro

We ventured in a little further and this is easily the most amazing zone I have seen in EQ so far. It is absolutely massive, it looks awesome (next time I'm turning spell effects on and it will look even better I'm told) and I think it will be a blast to Raid in. I also did one other thing in between all the raiding this week. I saw someone was organizing a run to see Lord Yelinak in Skyshrine. Now I have been to Skyshrine many times, but I have never seen Yelly himself. As I wanted to see how my faction was with him, I asked if I could tag along. After a LOOOOOOOOOONG ass run to get to him, there he was. One of the toughest MoB's in Velious, and guess what!?, I'm his Ally!!). Woot!, now next time when we drop Tormax I can put my hand up for his head. Mainly cause I want these.

Next to the Boots that Bertoxxulous drops, they are easily the best Caster footwear in the game and Bert is just a little bit harder to kill than Tormax.

Oh and a wee message to Solusek Ro and Rallos Zek. Southern Armada is coming for you....