This is so much more fun

(Two blog entries during one day? Feel free to throw rocks at me now.)


Right!

I'm at the new mesmer now.

While I will play the quests and missions quite in the ordinary sequence of events, I'm watching my own story in my mind during this, which is a bit different from the game's.

But nevermind that for now.

This mesmer has traveled with Kihm and Gheraz for now. No Koss, no Dunkoro, no other hero or hench.

While I really loathe dervishes, there is a reason for the usage of Gheraz. She's a Me/D now, too - but not wielding a scythe. I'm not masochistic enough to suffer through that.

I'm using the Elonian newbie skills, plus Wastrel's Demise (and Cry of Pain now, too), and I won't climb the sunspear ladder further than Captain, at most. At least not while on Istan and while getting ready to leave the island. Captain is IIRC the requirement for the Consulate Docks mission, and I don't want to throw rocks into my way.

To increase the fun, I'm not going to upgrade anything but the chest armor and the leggins, while on Istan. Plus perhaps any upgrades that collectors can offer.

While I wasn't sure what the paragon actually did for the team's progress, I am very sure what this mesmer does. Because you can't tell me that Gheraz and Khim wipe the floor with the mobs.

I'm at the point now where I'm recruiting Melonni - and there's the first instance of "required hero: Koss"... erm. This will be amusing with the lvl 3 Koss baby that I've got stored somewhere. But it's alright.


Most fun so far:

Killing Beautiful Ibogas. Every fight was quite some challenge. I had Dunkoro (accompanying NPC from his primary quest) with me, and I don't think that the lvl 6 henchs and me at lvl 6 could've done it without him.

Killing crazed harpies for the Diamond in the Dough. I needed perfect pulling maneuvres here. This was even more difficult than normally, because I haven't found a long- or flatbow yet! Pulling with a recurve bow while survivoring. Fun!

The Great Fire Flower in Zehlon Reach. Khim had died during General Morgahn's little fighting exercise. Gheraz had resurrected her. Khim died again during the fight near the NPC that offers this quest, and I had resurrected her. Well, Khim died again at the fight against a couple of necro skales not much later. I decided to do this quest anyway - and it worked!

The important thing is to be extremely careful and hopefully very precise with the hexing, at all times. No more shoddy skill usage as I did with the paragon.

Well, this is fun.


I won't do all side quests now, because I want to leave Istan relatively early.



Even more fun:

I've added Odurra for the partysize = 8 areas (Gheraz, Khim, Odurra, me). This actually seems to be sufficient, although there were moments of panic.

Like when a bunch of lvl 15 ancient undead started spiking me with Deathly Swarms.

Deaths of the henchs are quite likely. Monsters prefer Khim, of course, but they'll settle for Gheraz, too. I guess Me/Mo or Me/P would have been the smarter choice, as the team has been running out of res sigs quite a few times now. I tend to keep going then though, and hope for a morale boost or whatever.

The level 15 henchs from Kodlonu made me (lvl 12 and lowbie gloves, mask, boots) the primary target, so I had to resort to cowardly tactics: Hiding even behind Odurra, who's the backline of this team - Khim likes to run forward and to attack foes, while Gheraz is still wondering what "I'm targetting XY" is supposed to mean... in that regard, Khim is just like Alesia at the height of her moments of glory.

Doing the "critters of Dhuum (eh?) attack Kamadan" mission, I had fun with lvl 3 Khim and lvl 3 Gheraz vs those lvl 12 monsters. Luckily, the NPCs were helping me when I had to solo the last few scythes.

Recruiting Jin with the same henchs was also a tad bit difficult and led to me soloing Jin. Luckily, Gheraz and Khim had helped me to take out Sousuke, before they were gone.

I'm having fun with this.

But I think that Abasi might be just the man for another party slot, in the nearby future. I need some corsair involvement. That can wait until after I recruited Tahlkora, and until I'm almost ready to leave this island, though.



Update:

Sooo... Tahlkora is the hero that I will use regularly now. That's simply because I just don't believe in the protective powers of Healing Breeze and Orizon of Healing. This adventure here is meant to be hard, but not to be hopelessly so.

However, Tahlkora won't be using eliteskills until I do.

And we will of course break up on Shingjea Island, at least until I arrived at the camp in the Lagoon map.

So. Gheraz, Odurra, Tahkora (with a not very functional bar and no secondary yet) and me can win the Defiled Monument quest. That's nice to know.

But I think that I'll allow myself another henchman for the Blacktide Den mission. Abasi, obviously. He won't provide too much help, but he's got another res signet and is another body shield for Tahlkora.

Tahlkora has a disabled Rebirth as well.

Right. If I survive Blacktide Den, then I'll just rush along the following primary quests until the other continents are unlocked, and then be off.



And off to Shing Jea Island!
So, I got through Blacktide Den. With Abasi as the 5th member of the squad, it was actually extremely easy (more body shields made Tahlkora happy).

As the other heroes before, Tahlkora leveled obscenely fast during her quest and her mission, so she caught up with my own level very quickly.

Anyway, I then kept Abasi around, because Mehtanni Keys is just a bit too close to the edge with just Gheraz as the only amazing damage dealer (everyone knows that mesmers don't do any damages, so Odurra and me didn't count, of course.)

I also kept him around because I had the feeling that he and his shady past would be the reason why Tahlkora and me ended up in Shing Jea Island not much later - but that was actually not correct.

Instead, apparently Gheraz sold us out! *gasp*

At least, he happened to be with us when we arrived in Kaineng's Docks, and then he suspiciously disappeared. :P

I guess the conflict between his preachings about holy vocations and my mesmer escalated.

Yeah well. Tahlkora and me are now split off for the moment, so I walked to Shing Jea Monastery, downgraded my armor to AL 15, sold my amazing Istani shield and wand, and went off to the corsair outpost (the one with the two bosses, west of the newbie village outpost) to be rescued by Taya and Mai. They did that very well (even though the level difference is sort of ridiculous), and now they're bringing me to Togo because they don't understand common Elonian language.

My primary objective now is to get Tahlkora out of the other corsair camp, but I'll follow the Shing Jea newbie missions as well.



The students of Shing Jea Monastery are an odd sort. Most have glowing hands or hands that look as if they had been burned.

So, I didn't stay there for long and went to Minister Cho's Estate.

Right. Factions suffered from the same fault as Oblivion did - the player isn't the hero, but the (glorified) errand boy; or the (glorified) acolyte in the case of GW.

Cutscenes featuring some NPC, while the player character is even off-screen? Uhhm, that's not a good design.


Anyway, the mission is done (in 11:43), and Taya, Mai and me are getting along quite fine now. Communication between us is mostly sign-language though.


(sidenote: I take a melee along so that not everyone goes for the monk. A monk that runs around in panic is not a good asset. While I've done the tanking role myself before, especially in HM, I do not think that this is a good idea when I'm conciously downgrading my armor or conciously not upgrading my whole armor, at least.

But I do think now that a pet might actually do the job better than a Gheraz or a Mai... The pet is easier to convince that it shall run and attack (without the monk running to the frontline, while the melee is pondering what my command was supposed to mean); the pet does not accumulate DP; and I can revive the pet easily even from great range. Not to forget: if the pet dies, the monk won't go into a "must revive this poor tank now IMMEDIATELY while we're still in combat"-frenzy.

But well, thanks to the indoctrination done by Gheraz and co., I'm a Me/D for now.

A pet doesn't have a res sig, though. But there might be less need for monk revival action if the melee actually worked like a tank.)



Update

Headmaster Kaa had sent Taya, Mai and me to a visit of the library near Seitung Harbour. In Seitung, I met a ranger called Jin in a tavern. Contrary to most of the other Canthans, Jin actually did speak a bit of my language. Turns out that she knew of another corsair outpost, somewhere to the east. She said that she knew the way.

Since I know from this odd Pakuma fellow that there's rumour of another Elonian somewhere on this island, also captured by the corsairs, I immediately thought that this might be where Tahlkora was.

Well, Taya and Mai had a little chat with Jin in their birdlike language which I don't really understand, and then they agreed that we should just let this ranger find the way for us.

Maybe I shouldn't trust just everyone I meet in taverns though.

This journey was remarkably... odd.

Firstly, we got lost. Among literally dozens of crazed birdmen, Jin suddenly befriended a tigercat. Taya didn't seem to be very impressed with this new member of the party, and they started argueing. This also meant a lot of deaths of the lot of them, and I only could revive one of them until I had another morale boost... well, we ended up going back into Seitung Harbor.

Jin changed a few skills, and so did I, and then we went back into Yaya Bluffs, heading east this time.

It went a lot better this time, but Taya and Jin kept argueing and sniping remarks at each other during the entire trip. Mai was quiet as always but also annoyed. Annoyed at that stupid tiger, at Jin lagging behind to do some preparations, annoyed when Jin didn't resurrect them fast enough, and even annoyed at the weird spirits of shelter and union that Jin used.

But the annoyance aside - we found Tahlkora in that corsair camp!

She's in a really bad shape though, no wonder, given that she's been with those pirates for weeks now, and I think we should bring her back to the monastery or to Seitung for now. Anywhere with healers.

When we headed to the nearest outpost, Taya threw a total hissyfit when we didn't avoid some weird ritualist boss naga. Nobody died, but she says that she told us to avoid that one and we didn't listen...

So, she left immediately when we had entered the next town. She took Mai with her, too.

I'm going to ask Togo what to do now. He's in that library just east of Seitung, and it's on the way when we bring Tahlkora to there.



Well. In Zen Dajium (that's the name of that small town), I met this Panaku person again. When he heard that I needed to head back to Seitung, he volunteered to travel with us, and he even had a monk friend at hand. Someone named Tai. Jin and me joined up with them.

(13:39 for that mission with this team (Sister Tai, Panaku, Jin, me)? While the stupid tiger was stuck somewhere far back and I wasted time trying to get it back? All this while Zunraa had died early on and I never got around to get another one? Whoa.)

Togo told me that he knew of some phantastic healer who resides in a town named Lion's Arch. The journey to there shouldn't take longer than a week or so, if we take the fastest ship from Seitung.

Tyria. That's where Erudine lives, Odurra's sister. She had told me to travel and visit her one day when I told her that my secondary profession didn't really suit me at all (while Gheraz was out of earshot, for once.) Erudine supposedly knows of some way to change the secondary profession.

Well... with Canthans speaking in that funny incomprehensible tongue, with Istan full of sunspear fanatics and "holy warriors" and corsairs and corruption... maybe Tyria isn't such a bad choice. And Tahlkora really needs a healer.



Update - I've arrived at Lion's Arch

Tahlkora is better now. At least, she isn't delusional anymore. She is still weak and exhausted though.

On the ship, I met an Elonian fighter named Koss. He was quite full of himself and plans to travel to an area called Ascalon, because he wants to join the king's finest. He heard that they are always looking for great heroes like himself, and that they have special shiney swords.

Oh, Jin stayed back at Seitung Harbor. She says that she wants to show "that monk" (Taya) how much her tiger really kicks butt. Good luck to her.

Anyway, we are in Lion's Arch now. I met that "excellent" monk that Togo talked about. I don't know... he looks like a newbie to me with him being level 6 only, but at least he is an Elonian. Yes, I am prejudiced against those foreigners (well, natives). He also does decidedly not look like a corsair.

Tahlkora said that it's fine and that she trusts him and that I should move on to Erudine, because that's so important for me. So, I'm going to leave her to the Mending and Watchful Spirit that this Dunkoro fellow said he would use to heal her.

So, I am actually going to join the team that this Koss has set up. Erudine is in Ascalon, too. I don't know if I can trust him, but I am quite sure that I could just hex him very badly if he tries anything. I owe that to headmaster Kaa and his lessons.


Oh, and I got me a new dress! Finally, a dress that covers my legs again and that keeps me warm. Honestly, those Canthans don't know how to dress properly. And besides looking ridiculous and quite indecent, those short skirts got really cold with their low temperatures and snow and stuff.

(this dress "update" means a downgrade from AL 45 to AL 30, but nevermind.)



Update, just out of Lion's Arch

Koss really is full of himself.

He's also accompanied by a pink flamingo, for some reasons.

Well, our new monk, Alesia, doesn't seem to mind. We also have another mesmer on board. His name is Dunham.

All is going well so far, and Koss is acutally gaining levels quite quickly now. Maybe soon he'll catch up with the level of Alesia and Dunham.

If nothing else, he's useful to Shatter Hexes from.


And he, or rather Dunham, actually know the way to Ascalon. At least, we're heading east now instead of getting lost somewhere.



(Another side note... I've noobed down the hero skillbars considerably, and none of them is going to use any elite before I (in shape of this character here) have captured it or at least crossed a boss that had this elite skill. So, no Koss lvl 3 baby with Eviscerate anymore.

I will probably have to walk over to EotN soon though, so that the character can meet Ogden in Borli's Pass on the way back out of Ascalon... but I'm not in a hurry.

It might also be nice to have more heroes available just to meet them at some point - Hayda and Xandra come to mind in that regard; but since I won't upgrade my armor to the max level anytime soon, I don't think that roaming around in EotN would be such a good idea at this point. Once I've got max armor from Droknar's Forge (probably), we'll see.)


Update - arrived in Ascalon, but what the...

The journey through the Shiverpeaks went really well. At one point, we had to seek shelter from a snow storm in a cozy place called "Ice Tooth Cave", but it sounds worse than it was.

Koss leveled up even more and got cockier by the minute. Still, he was useful for Shatter Hexing, and all was well.

Then, just after we had made it through the lushy green Foothills of Ascalon and arrived at the village of Grendich; just when we were joking about Dunham, who had left the group immediately when we had entered the town, as with all the other towns and outposts before... suddenly all hell broke lose.

Clouds of Ashes, fires breaking out and searing down the grass on the village's square... people panicking and running each other down in a desperate attempt to get out of the inferno...

We three were close to the courthouse of the village and sought shelter inside, together with another few of these Ascalons. This was just a lucky chance, because the courthouse is now all that's left of the village. The whole rest of the town is destroyed.

And then, not much after the inferno had died down, literally hundred and hundreds of strange furry creatures ran past, towards the west.

Koss went mental at this point. He yelled something about him outnubering those foes, and charged off, after that giant mob of monsters. I guess he had totally lost it.

Alesia and me just looked at each other and continued to take care of the wounded.

We haven't heard of Koss since then, also not of Dunham. Knowing Dunham, he might still be alive though.


Well.

We are at a loss now of what to do. I still want to seek out Erudine. Maybe I could help. Alesia wants to travel to Ascalon and try to help. One of the village's guardsmen, Stefan, would like to travel with us to the main city of this country.


I have no idea what happened, but I do hope that those furry things won't actually get past the Shiverpeak Mountains. Or perhaps that they will get frozen to death in some snowstorm...



(I really like this experiment of "how many paragraphs do fit into one blog entry", by the way! Now I know that my vanquishing reports could've been much longer than I thought.)



Update: Now I'm in Ascalon City

It did really show that Dunham wasn't with the team any more. I had no clue where to go to; Alesia says that she has no clue at all, because she just follows the leader. Stefan... said that he had a clue.

So, we followed him.

Next thing I know is that we were fighting a whole lot of those furry creatures, because Stefan had led us straight into one of their outposts. After that, we were fighting Hydras. No Ascalon City to be found.

We returned to the shelter of Grendich Courthouse and looked at our makeshift map again and realized that we probably went too far north.

So we moved out again, and got lost again. And again. And some more.

I finally found Ascalon City.

There are odd people there. In all the chaos and destruction, they are recruiting violently for their guilds... or is is gangs?

I stayed clear of them and looked for someone official and found a warmaster Tydus. When I asked him about Erudine, he suddenly seemed to think that I wanted to be recruited into their anti-charr resistance. (charr is the name of these furries, apparently. And the people here blame the charr for the destruction).

Next thing I knew is that we were shoved off into a mission by him. Alesia and Stefan think we should just do it. I think I will tag along.


Update - on our own again

I can't help but to think that this was another way of (forceful) guild recruitment that this warmaster did to me and my group... first, he sent us out scouting, then he ordered us to help fight back this new invasion.

And all that just for some information on the whereabouts of the person I'm looking for.

Luckily, he was true to his word and sent me to a scribe who looked up Erudine's whereabouts in a census. Her whereabouts before this "searing", as the people are calling it now.

Well, now I have directions towards this Serenity Temple, so we'll head there. Alesia and Stefan do still want to tag along.


Update - Serenity Temple, at last

At last, we arrived at Serenity Temple, or rather it's ruins. It is next to the biggest impact crater of the searing that I have seen so far, and yet, a huge part of the temple still stands tall. Erudine survived the searing, and so did a lot of the other acolytes and priests.

She is nothing like Odurra. While Odurra is quite playful, Erudine is extremely serious, but also a lot more scholared.

We had a very long talk. I also had long talks with Rashenna, the high priestess of the temple. Erudine taught me a lot about the technical formalities and scientific basics, Rashenna taught me a bit about the spiritual background.

So, there are 5 divines.

I must say that I never paid much tought about this before, as spirituality on Istan was mostly about personality worship - Sogolon the protector, or even Gheraz the almighty. *rolleyes*.

I must think about all these informations a bit more, and I also want to study more with Erudine.

She already told me that profession changes are possible after some sort of ritual done in the Crystal Desert, which will be almost like returning home... but she has so much more to teach me.

I will just stay here for at least a few more weeks.

Alesia and Stefan moved on to help fight the Ascalonian army some more.


Update: moving on

It's funny how the time flies past so quickly when there's a lot to do and to learn.

Erudine wants to travel to Vabbi, because of the huge library they've got there. She feels that Rashenna and her acolytes can handle these sad remains of a temple on their own.

I had several more conversations with the scholars here and I've come a bit more to peace with my /D attunement. It is a way of being attuned to Dwayna and Melandru, they said. (Dwayna and Melandru being worshipped here, coincidendally...)

Most of all, having a secondary profession does not mean that you're a failed primary of that profession - as Gheraz always told me. It just means that it's something to draw additional power from.

Yeah well, I will accompany Erudine up to the city of Lion's Arch, from where she will depart towards Vabbi and I'll try to figure out a way to the Crystal Desert. There are no regular ship routes to the Crystal Desert, because it's sort of a total wasteland, they're telling me.

We'll head off towards the teleporter portal in old Surmia's academy tomorrow and then figure out our way from Nolani.


Update - we're not in Ascalon anymore

So, a couple of things.

Firstly, Erudine was mightily amused by how we got lost all the time (I blame Stefan, of course!), but she told me that there might actually be someone interested in this erm "talent" of mine (mine? It's Stefan that gets us lost!). She said that people might be interested in detailed maps, and given that I happen to see places that nobody but monsters has ever seen before, I could potentially make a fortune with it, if I put those things on a map.

That is an interesting suggestion, since I'm rather broke.

The second thing is not as amusing. During the last couple of weeks, Alesia has changed, and not to the better. She has become more fiercely religious and zealous than before. For instance, while we were resting, she actually asked me to confess my sins. What?

That last religious person I've traveled with sold me to some corsairs, and now she's starting to become a zealot?

As soon as we arrived in Rin, or rather the remains of Rin, I told her what I thought of this and she got really upset and stormed off.

Well...

There was another teleporter in Rin which led us into the outskirts of the realm of the Deldrimor dwarves, and here we are, in some desolate snowy hell.

Luckily, Erudine says that there is a shorter way to the east than the one we used for the journey to Ascalon.

I don't think that we can make this journey without a monk though...



(I'll go for a medium risk operation now and go and recruit Ogden & co., perhaps even Gwen, though I don't think I'll meet her any time soon yet.

Well, this was fun (Alesia, Stefan, Dunkoro, me)! But I am level 19 now instead of 18... :( and Dunkoro leveled up to lvl 7.

I don't like it though how the attributes are totally screwed up while in EotN as a newb, so I won't try to get Gwen just now. Especially not in my phantastic armor from LA with AL 30. Hehe.

After I had Ogden and Vekk, I added an expedition into the zaishen menagerie to my offscreen activities; to outfit some more heroes with their rather exotic pets, so that they are ready.

Ogden will be a healer, and I have no idea how to set up a good healer skillbar at all, so he just gets some red bar pushers and Cure Hex. I don't think that he should use any protection skills rightnow. Doing Borli's Pass and Frost Gate with a lvl 20 monk hero instead of Alesia is OPed enough as it is.

I also need to figure out how Alesia will have made it to Gates of Kryta, since she stormed off in Rin... buuut... I'll figure out something. Or perhaps Dunkoro won't be fully smite when I meet him there. Smiter's Boon or something. Won't be easy to pull off with a lvl 7 hero though.)


Update - Grooble's Gulch

While we were standing around in that desolate village and wondering what to do next, guess who turned up? Dunham!

Apparently, he had hidden when the charr ran past Grendich Village, and then he had somehow made his way back to the Shiverpeaks on his own.

He had no news of Koss, but had heard odd things that must have happened in Kryta and in a place to the south called Orr. Apparently, the charr did actually make it past the mountains, but there were defeated on the other side.

Now I worry for Tahlkora again... all these weeks, I thought that the charr couldn't have ever made it past the mountains.

Anyway, Dunham knew a monk. It's a dwarf who is looking for a group to the western edge of the mountain range, from where he wants to head to the south to the dwarven capital city.

Sounds good enough.

He is very high level, but he says that he hasn't been on active duty for quite some time, having mostly done stone carvings and the like for years. He joined our team though. I'm sure that his level can make up for lack of experience, and well, we need a monk.

Turns out that he is accompanied by a white bear. With a red bow.

Why is it that everyone here has a pet of some sorts? I don't!

Right. We made it to Grobble's Gulch now. The journey was pretty much uneventful: The deldrimor dwarves were still a bit shaken by the charr rampaging through their land, but it's a civilized and quiet area without many monsters or other things.

Looks llike we're already halfway through the mountains. This path is indeed much easier than the dryder infested northern path that we had traveled through earlier.


Update - back at Lion's Arch

The journey from Grooble's Gulch to Beacon Perch was just as non-remarkable as the first half of this journey.

Ogden then left us and headed towards the south. He says that it's a long journey from Beacon's Perch to Droknar's Forge, but that he can make it, with that new group of high level people that he found in that small village.

We then headed on to the west.

Now... Kryta has changed.

When I was here some weeks ago, we could just travel through the land and nobody really cared. But this time? There were militia right at the border between Kryta and the Shiverpeaks already and they wanted to see papers.

Papers which we didn't have.

Luckily, there was someone nearby who recognized me. That newbie monk in who's company I had left Tahlkora. Dunkoro was his name. These militia guys in white uniforms did know him and so they allowed us to travel to the beach and to talk to their superiour if I would be allowed entrance into Kryta. That officer Hablion told us to report to his superiour, who resides in D'Alessio, west of Lion's Arch.

Yikes. I wonder who the superiour or that superiour will be...

They call themselves "White Mantle", and they remind me of the Sunspears. That is not a good memory.

Of the journey to the beach and our new monk friend, I have scary memories. He turned from being a Mending noob to a smiter. There was stuff on that beach that dealt a lot of damages, and he healed us with Smiter's Boon. Scary to the max.

Oh, and he has got yet another pet. It's like an epidemy with those pets.

But well, it worked.

He told us that Tahlkora is safe and in a village called Bergen Hot Springs, to the west. There are supposedly a lot of monks and she's supposedly feeling well enough again.

I hope that these White Mantles won't give me any more trouble with their official papers routines.