Everquest Southern Armada Raids Week Twenty Five

12/08/03 Week Twenty Five

Well its been a damn long 10 days or so. For those of you who live under a rock there is a rather nasty Worm running about the place that uses a Microsoft exploit to attack its victims. NAI says that within 3 hours of it becoming known to them they had seen it on 5000 servers, within 24 hours it had affected 250,000 machines they were aware of. The reason I am telling you this?, well sometime in the last 2 years I became the default Anti Virus guy for my company, so this whole issue has management panicked and keeping me really busy. However happy to say not a single virus has managed to make it through our systems.

That's why I am really, really late with this update. If I get the order of kills wrong or otherwise stuff it up, well the mistakes are all mine.

First up was last Monday. This was an "Impromptu raid" so we only had 71 level 65's in the raid and 1 level 64. It was a very disappointing turn out *grin* <--- Sarcasm by the way for those who have a problem recognizing it. A very, very quick run to Akheva Ruins and a fast drop of the Itraer Vius (a question was asked "Is he hard?", I nearly went blue from laughing so hard.)

After ganking and then abusing the corpse of the IV it was on to our old friend Shei Vinitras. I used to sit and dribble about the PhatLewtz on Shei, now I own pretty much all of it!. Is Shei a he or a she?, I've never been too sure. He is still a damn fun kill tho, especially when I get to kite off some adds, snare, run, summon, *smack*, run, summon, *smack* hehehe it's fun.

After the ease at which we blew thru the caverns we decided to have a go at something really hard. Agnarr was up, so we all headed over to the Bastion Of Thunder. This time the 85/15 thing worked and we actually managed to get the non flagged into the zone. Now after the mess we made of this last time I was a little apprehensive, but a comment was made in the Necro channel "Last time I did this with Unity it took just over an hour, we will take ages". So this time I started a timer as soon as the first MOB was engaged.

Of course the first name to go down was Evynd Firestorm.

This swine resists Funeral Pyre and for no other reason do I hate him. We dropped him fast, with a little rezzing and reorganization we powered up to the second level. I don't know what Mr Emmerick Skyfury is like for other classes but for Nec's he is one of the "fun" kills. I basically get to LOAD him with DOT's. I switch out all other spells and just load him up and do what a Nec is supposed to do, massive damage.

He fell over like a Girlie at schoolies. I don't think we even managed to sacrifice a Pally. So it was quickly up to the 3rd level. Now this is were we came unstuck last time, I needn't have worried, we were on Form!!. Gateways were downed in rapid succession by the Wizzies, adds were off tanked (Go the Pallies!) and the rest of us just savaged Jolur Sandstorm!

Agnarr's ass was parked against the wall, after a really fast round of rebuffs we engaged and just GANKED the bastard. Of course there is the little matter of a few adds that spawn while killing Agnarr. Not a problem for Genosin the Uber Shadow Knight!!.

Olin Stormtide

Hibdin Cyclone

Agnarr the Storm Lord

51 minutes from first zone entry to the death of Agnarr and That's including about 10 minutes of dicking around.

The real raid was on Tuesday night and we went straight at Rallos Zek in the Plane of Tactics. Hopes were high after the performance the night before. The initial run was a little rocky, partially our fault with a few silly mistakes being made, but due largely to the damn buggy script again. We zoned in, killed all the yard trash and gathered the triggers.

Decorin Berik

We get into position, drop the triggers and in comes Tallon Zek.

Gimp Boy

He died efficiently and in rapid succession we had Vallon incoming.

Unfortunately due to a bit of confusion amongst the off tanks and some weird pathing on the pull, he came with about 5 friends. A quick wipe, a quick reform ( Talionis spies were hanging about the place ) and back to the triggers again.

Soon to be dead trigger MOB

Tallon Again

Vallon Again

The second time round the whole sequence took about half the time of the first. People calmed themselves, we had our little shake down run and we were ready for Rallos.

We made it up to the fake Rallos room and pulled him.

Back to the ZI and down into the pit for the real fight. Rallos Zek the Warlord is INCOMING!!

This was one of those fights that just balanced on a razors edge. If one or two things had gone our way we would have taken him. Unfortunately those things went the way of Rallos and at 2% health we wiped, We really wanted to be the first guild to drop him on our first run. That honor will have to go to some other guild unfortunately. But the fact we got him to 2% puts him on the "not yet, but soon" list. The night we got Rydda'Dar to his death walk but we wiped, we knew the MOB was definitely killable by us. Rallos Zek the Warlord will die to Southern Armada and soon.

To make up for the disappointment of Rallos, the Lewt Gods smiled down on us and the Emperor Ssraeshza was up and good to go for a third round with SA on Friday. A quick run to Ssraeshza Temple and a little quiet key farming on the third floor we zoned into the Emperors chambers...

Prepped...

and nailed the Emperor.

To quote our illustrious leader <---- NOT sarcasm, there will be a test on this later so I hope you are paying attention.

"Well it certainly felt like pharming to me...well timed, lavish pharming."

The Emperor has definitely gone on to the "Farmable's" list and will be providing us with the PhatLewtz for many moons to come. There was much other killing this week, BOT Tower bosses, the XTC fell to our power and several others I wasn't around for. As I said at the top of this missive, this week was rather busy and being on training Wed-Fri meant I kind of needed to be vaguely awake in class, so I dropped out a bit early for a couple of the kills.

However a screen shot of the Plane of Fire was promised. It's only the zone in but hey it's a Screenie :)

Well that was week 25, week 26 is being worked on as you read this and may even go up shortly after this update.

Everquest Southern Armada Raids Week Twenty Four

04/08/03 Week Twenty Four

Wow, what a night. Just wow. Southern Armada's demonstration of DPS and control against Bertoxxulous would be I believe, second to nobody. Maybe KTF could do it faster but not with more style.

First up. The traditional Banord "My Loot table is up my ass" Paffa smacking. I have completely blown out my merit this week, I don't even want him to drop the damn earring for me. I just want him to drop it to justify the continuous and extensive beat down we have laid on him. There is a number of Necromancer's in SA who DESERVE that earring and that fat bastard should drop it.

Now since we were in the Crypt of Decay and Bert was showing his ugly face we decided to get revenge for last weeks little fubar. We kicked off the event and just powered through it. We dropped the Ten Kings inside of 65 minutes. Within 70 we had added Bertoxxulous to that total. Just wow, it was smooth, it was clean and it had style. What a Kill!. I actually managed to get a couple of pic's of the various Kings as well.

Darwol Adan

Pzo Ardan

Meedo Adan

And finally the rotting, skinny swine him self...

Bertoxxulous,
God of Disease and all things smelly (Dwarves)

I actually really like the Bert run, its fun, its challenging and it really sorts out who can and who cant when it comes to Guilds. You get it wrong once during Bert and its a wipe, as we proved last week.

Now each of the 10 kings has a chance to drop at least one fairly decent item, its a small chance but its there. Last night we just about got them all!. Mallee got one of the coolest toys I have seen in game so far. I didn't turn on spell effects so you cant see the cool blue flame dripping off it!. Grats mate!, you deserved to upgrade that sword :)

I, mean while managed to replace the crappy shoes I had been wearing with a brand new (well rotting and diseased really) pair. I really wasn't expecting that at all!. I figured after last weeks shield upgrade I would be out for quite some time!. I think I now have all of the focus items including the incredibly rare (6 on the server I've been told) Burning Affliction 4 item, the Ceramic Shackles of Torment. That's the item that looks like a black sword with red runes I carry in my Primary. I have never owned anything in the Game that I get requests to link. The Shackles I get link requests for every day.

I was talking to a young Nec who had sent me a tell asking me a question and during the course of the conversation he came out with "Everyone knows the Uber Necro's of Southern Armada". Apparently the 10+ active raiding Necro's in SA are well known around the server. We find it quite funny to do a "/who all necro 65" and ninety percent of the names are SA.

Wow!, 6 months ago I was just a young-un yearning for the "high end game" without really understanding what that meant. Now I'm an "Uber Necro" in an Uber Guild. Holy shit how did that happen?

Anyway enough rambling, more Killing. While we were dropping Bert, Paffa showed his fat ass again. He peered into the darkness and thought "Oh Goody, Southern Armada isn't here, I can come out and pretend to be a big man for a little bit". A very stupid idea Mister Paffa, very stupid indeed. We zoned out, back in and smacked him.

Next up was Bastion Of Thunder Tower's. There is so much trash in the way before you get to the fun stuff..

Vann Militis

along with a smattering of named's...

Iri

Now maybe it was because we were already pumped from killing Bert but the clearing of trash seemed to go a lot faster than usual and we very quickly pulled and killed:

Kuanbyr Hailstorm

a quick change of Towers and it was time for Eindride Icestorm

The rest of SA decided to keep going and I believe they dropped the remaining 2 Tower Bosses in short order. At this point it was close to 2:00am and I decided it was time to log. This Thursday's Raid is going to rock!, we have a big patch Wednesday so we should be able to get the drop on much Gankable goodness including multiple runs at Rallos. (Sol Ro Mini's please please please!)

Wednesday, patch ran for a million hours so no post patch Ganking. Then of course there is the traditional post patch, patch because SOE couldn't get a patch right with a gun to their head. We managed a quick run across to Sanctus Seru for a fast Lord Inquisitor Seru drop and that was about it.

He died, I logged, there wasn't a lot more to it so I was really hoping for big things on Saturday. Along with a butt load of dicking around and waiting, I pretty much got big things!.

I had a largely quiet weekend this week. All the Sydney peeps got together for some heavy drinking on Friday night. So Friday I logged in, checked all the usual solo spots (camped), checked for any groups (no, all full of bots, its weird, 2xbotting just wasn't done on Karana, on Prexus its incredibly common), talked to a couple of friends, checked to see if my VP key Mob was up (nope and camped anyway), thought casually about logging in my Tank (Woot he's across!!) and decided to log off and feel depressed cause everyone was drinking and I couldn't go. :( WAAAHH!! I want my drinking buddy back!! *sulks*

Say hello to my leetle friend!
Garakk Grimsoul

So I had a pretty quiet night Friday. Saturday was a different proposition!. Logged on late to find Unity doing RZ and already 90% of the way through. So I ran around and did some of those housekeeping things you always need to do, Food, Water, 'Dots, Bones etc until they were finished with the kill.

Initially the Unity raid Leaders said head for POEarth, then they changed their minds and we all headed out to the Tower of Solusek Ro because Solusek Ro, the Burning Prince, was up and preparing himself for death!. Zoned in, formed up, fought our way through the trash to Sol Ro's room. Now I am not flagged for Sol Ro's room, you need to kill all 5 mini's and I haven't managed to get into a pickup to do that, and a hell of a lot of other people weren't. The raid leaders of Unity (/bow to Xomax) put a hell of a lot of time, effort and sweat into making sure as many people as possible were in that room for the fight.

After all the Drama of getting people in to his room and a lot of waiting we were finally ready for Sol Ro himself.

He's waiting for us!

A Close up of his Highness...

We cleared his guards, waited a bit more, prepped and Sol Ro was Incoming!

Oops wrong position...

Now that's better, stay there...

I ended up on the 'page list as he was dropping tanks like flies at one point, it came very close to a wipe and Unity was combat rezzing people back in, but damn they recovered beautifully and took him out. One round of 1800 swats from him and I went Splat. However I was rezzed back in facing the PP, hailed him and DING! Plane of Fire enabled!.

I zoned in just to say I had done it, completely forgot to take a Screenie and zoned out. That was about it. There is only one spot to solo in POFire and its pretty much perma camped by Necro's, so until Southern Armada starts to raid into the Elemental Zones I probably wont get to go back into them a lot.

Someone objected to last weeks screen shot of a single mob being engaged by a group with all graphics on. They said it doesn't really show what a fully engaged MOB look's like during a raid. So lets correct that. Play spot the MOB with me. These are two screen shots of a MOB in Sol Ro's Tower fully engaged by Unity, taken from (subjective) about 60 feet away. Can you see the MOB?

And happy birthday to me!

This is my sixth month on Prexus WOOT!

Everquest Southern Armada Raids Week Twenty Three

30/07/03 Week Twenty Three

I had an unpleasant interchange with a person on Monday night which caused me to log out immediately, or I was going to say and do very nasty things. So I logged in on Tuesday feeling a little down, but after a chat with a couple of people (thank you) I perked right up. I was looking forward to Tuesdays raid because I was fairly sure RZtW was going to be up. There was in fact much PoP goodness up, but Kez first called the raid to the Plane of Disease for a little FatBoy back flagging.

I of course did the obvious and ran straight to the Crypt of Decay for "I have no ears" Banord Paffa. It wasn't till I zoned in and was wondering where the raid was that I realized.. DOH!

This was as clean a Grummus kill as I have seen so far. Absolutely flawless. I think we lost a hippy treehugger during the Grummus kill itself but that was it. First up of course we needed a key so Gryme the Crypt Guardian had to die.

Then a quick run up the stairs, smacking some nasty undead about (I couldn't even get a nuke off they were dieing so damn fast) and it was Aramin the Spider Guardian's turn.

Finally we ran down and Grummus died. I think from entering the zone to Grummus down was 45 minutes tops.

One thing I did notice about Grummus this time that I have never seen before. When he runs, he prances!. I have my suspicions that our friend Grummus may in fact be a little light in the loafers! No real bloke would ever be caught dead running like that. I wonder if he and Berty get together and have little pajama parties now and again?!.

In the 5 or 6 times I have now seen Grummus Killed I have never seen him drop a Pus Covered Beetle Carapace. Finally last night he did, and I won it woot!. So now my transformation to a warrior has begun!. I have the Sword, I have the Shield, now all I need is the Body Armour to complete the look! Well technically the Body Armour is a robe but dribble dribble drool drool anyway.

Next is the MOB run we have all been waiting for. Southern Armada's first run at Rallos Zek the Warlord in the Fortress of Zek. We formed up and set up for the kill. We managed to get to the 2 triggers with little or no effort.

Decorin Berik

That's when it all started to go wrong. It was announced over and over and over how the next part of the script was to go, it was announced again and again to turn attack on assist off and many other things were heavily repeated. These things were still happening. If you don't want to pay attention during the raid, why the fuck did you turn up?. The Necro channel started to get very pessimistic before we had even pulled Tallon Zek. First run was ugly and we wiped nasty style.

Fast reform, re-pull the triggers and Tallon Zek again. This one was Flawless. This is the Southern Armada I LOVE to watch. Everyone pays attention, does what they are supposed to and the MOB dies like it was an Orc_Pawn_01 in East Commons.

Perfection. Unfortunately the script was bugged to hell and within 2 minutes we had Vallon, 4 Guards and 5 MOBS between us and Vallon's room on top of us. Second wipe. Ah well, reform and getting ready to go again, Vallon back in his room, rezzing happening, and POP, the dead Tallon is on top of the raid, where he had no right to be. Third wipe. At this point it was determined that there was 2 Vallon's up and Tallon was back again, so we decided to call it a bugged script and settle for the night.

S.A headed out at this point to drop Tower Bosses in the Bastion of Thunder, it was close to 1:30 AM again, so I logged. We were hoping the Emperor was going to honor us with a visit on Wednesday night, unfortunately he declined. There was lots and lots of Ssra flagging going on as well, unfortunately I was in the first XP group I had managed in 3 weeks and I wasn't going to give it up. I am really hoping that we get to take a lot more runs at Rallos Zek. I am elemental flagged and all that, but I really really want to drop him with SA. Kill him a few times, a bit more back flagging and hopefully we can move on to Sol Ro's Tower and Sol Ro himself!.

Always Remember: Everyone comes along for the ride.

Friday, bottle of Rum and 2 bottles of Coke, Ice in the Ice bin, and I'm good to go. First off is a quick run down to Kael Drakkal for some killing of Giant royalty. Now personally I am never happier than when killing Giants so I was really looking forward to this. A quick port to the Wakening Lands, and its time for mass giant death. One of my favorite calls in EQ is "inc lots", the pull team didn't fail us and brought pretty much every giant between the Throne Room and the Wakening Lands zone line.

I remember seeing one of the Karana server Uber guilds in action about 2 years ago. I was just hanging at the zone line when I heard Novae were incoming to kill Tormax. At the time I needed the faction hits so I contacted the raid leader and asked if I could hang out for faction. The raid leader kindly acquiesced and I stayed to watch them enter the zone. Thing that amazed me number one: One of their Monks hung out at the zone in at Wakening to tank the two guard giants, why?, for fun. I was stunned, a Monk tanking a Giant?!, wow.

Thing that amazed me Number Two: Their pull team just pulled everything in the zone including Tormax and killed it at the zone line. At that point I had never seen anything like it (considering my guild had just graduated from killing Vindi for the first time). Now I not only get to see the same thing I get to participate, which is even better!. I often wonder is there some young (60-) toon standing around watching us do the thing's we do and saying to themselves, "Wow I wish I could do that some day!" and being amazed at players who can take MOB's like Tormax out with such style.

Tormax, King

I am about to bring my Warrior across from Karana (Put the application in on Sunday). I will have to park him in KD just in case Vindi's breastplate drops!. All our tanks have better and Derakor the Vindicator is such a sucker...

Next up, a quick run across the world, damn I love the POP book system, and up to Terris Thule's hangout. Quite a few of her Guards decided to dispute our right of passage. This was a very, very foolish idea as they died thick and fast.

I so want this model as the 65 pet. And I want my horsie to look like this when I go into Skelly form while riding. Somebody at SOE make it so please.

Terris was the first mob I ever experienced a wipe with, with Southern Armada so she holds a special place in my heart *sigh*. Not enough to stop us Ganking her though. I really enjoy this fight, it's a lot of fun.

Terris Thule

Once she was dead and the PhatLewtz had been handed out, we had time for a quick Zek smacking in the Fortress of Zek and Tallon died hard. I didn't even cast on the bastard, had full HP, didn't get near him, I was just taking an SS for this weekly tome and the bastard detonated on me. I think I'm just going to stay outside the room from now on, maybe run in when he is 50% and he is fixated on someone else. I WILL figure out how to survive him!

We then headed to the Crypt of Decay for an attempt at Bertoxxulous. I was really looking forward to this as last time I never got a chance to actually see him in action, this time I was planning on wandering around the corner to get a screenshot of him.

Unfortunately as a Necro you don't get to see a lot during the Bertoxxulous ring fight. Its basically face the wall and Nuke, or if it gets really interesting you get to mezz a mob for 5 seconds until the Chanters get to it. I did manage to get one screen shot of one named King.

Kavilis Adan

SA was not on form during the fight. I kind of compare it to a drunk professional boxer facing off against a talented amateur. The amateur is still going to get his ass kicked, there is no doubt about that, but he manages to get a few damn nice smacks in against the Professional. It was messy, lets say that.

When I write these weekly ramblings I tend to try and be as general as I can about the encounters we do. I don't want to give away tactics or specifics about an encounter in case I spoil it for someone. However I think I can safely say this without ruining the Bertoxxulous ring event for anyone. When you finally get to Bert himself and you move to his room for the pull, don't get up and stand on the fucking tombs. Try it, its not nice. Wipe. Damn it two hours, 144 Man hours completely wasted. Ah well, shit happens and we will get his ass next time.

Wipe out...

Saturday was fun. I joined up with the kind folks over at Unity for my first run at the Elemental Plane of Water. WOOT! My first time raiding an Elemental!. We formed up in the little beach thingy and moved into the tunnels. As would be expected in such a place most of the MOB's are water based creatures.

A Barracuda

A Great White

Now the MOB's themselves aren't too hard, yard trash is a bit like the BOT Giants in terms of hardness. What makes this zone tough is the fact that its all underwater. Go and get your Enduring Breath item now. Maneuvering and positioning in here is a whole new ball game. You have to be tight and well controlled as moving through the zone is all about short sharp moves. If this was a regular dungeon I would say its a well designed dungeon crawl. The trick in here is to keep moving or you will never beat the re spawn.

First named up was Grioihin the Wise. He isn't that tough but he's got a NASTY AOE unresistable stun that makes it hard for the tanks to hold aggro and the clerics to keep healing the tanks.

Incoming Grioihin the Wise

He went down, messy, but he died. Half the raid wiped, we started rezzing people in, make sure the first thing you do is loot your EB item, or like me you are going to die and have to be re rezzed *self-smack*. We reformed and ventured even deeper into the zone, we got lost at one point and had to backtrack but we ended up visiting Hydrotha and nailing his fishy ass to the wall. This guy is tough, he has the HP of some of the Ssra mobs with 5 times the damage output and a slow proc on the MT.

We ventured even further in and found this guy. Fishlord Craiyk. I don't know if he summons mobs, just agro's them or is just a pain in the ass. But DO NOT talk to the little bastard. Someone did and we ended up with a nasty named and half a dozen of his friends. That was the end of that and it was a rez at the GY time.

At that point I had to log, so I got my rez and headed out after DMFing the entire raid again. I am off tonight to go camp the words for GDMF *sigh*.

I also managed to get into a Sol Ro Tower group or two this week, killing a lot of these guys.

A Sentry of Ro

Someone asked my why I never have spell effects turned on during my screen shots. They said that the pics would look really cool. I do have all models turned on which is tough enough, but with spell effects on you get the following. This is a screen shot with only one party casting on the mob.

With a full raid casting, quite often you simply cannot see the mob. It disappears in a welter of spell effects. It is pretty, yes, but it also turns my PC into a slide show, and my box is reasonably high end.