...faces look ugly when you're alone, women seem wicked...

Quitting smoking makes you nasty... OK, that’s true and I been smoking 24 years so I got a lot of nasty to dish out.

Did another FoV in Xarcaband last night. Thief/dancer really doesn’t pound out the damage. Took over an hour to do page 5 despite being 2 levels higher than the toughest enemy I faced. I think I mentioned that I don’t like soloing thief for XP? Well I have now. Chatting on the LS and get invited by Mousie to tag along with her and Usul (in a level 38 sync). Ordinarily I would have said no with martial master active and me needing to skill-up. However, I’m not getting any skill-ups as it is so I figure why not?

Now they are both leveling ninja/dancer so I figure thief/dancer would be redundant. I decide to go thief/ninja for the extra dagger. Well it does not go smoothly. Part of it is probably a difference in playing styles. When I /dancer Drain Samba is up 100% of the time (unless I have reason to do Aspir or I’m fighting undead which are immune), unless I’m blocked by a paralysis or something from getting it off. It just seems to increase survivability to me.

In addition, when I am in a group I am always on the opposite side of a mob, since it seems to affect specials and the like. Doing this is especially important when working with a thief below level 60. Thief’s signature move is SATA>weapon skill (Sneak Attack Trick Attack), at that level the WS being Viper Bite. Now there are multiple elements to that move. Sneak Attack is a guaranteed Critical Hit when done from behind the enemy, at level 38 SA Viper Bite does about 200-220 damage. Trick Attack provides a bonus to damage (but not a guaranteed hit) when striking from behind a party member (regardless of which way the enemy is facing) and gives the hate generated from it to the guy you are behind, Trick Attack Viper bite doing about 150 at level 38. The 2 are synergistic if you can manage to SATA>WS from behind the mob and a pt member it does about 415 at that level. With neither SA nor TA working my Viper Bite only does about 60 at that level. Quite a disparity in damage as you can see. SATA is why you almost always see a thief in any party with a ninja tank, they are there for hate control.

Well, I’m already ready to rip the face off a bull rhinocerous and piss in what’s left if it will get me a cigarette, obviously not the best mood for patience and understanding. Usul and Mousie are both friends and Mousie I’m especially careful of not hurting because of the issues in her life (hers to reveal if she wishes, consult her blog if she gives you the invite). So I’m grinding my teeth, punching my desktop and pounding down an adult beverage every time I see that message that I did less than 400 on an SATA Viper.

Incidentally, now about 60 hours since my last cigarette as I write this and the urge is worse, not better. I imagine I’m going to be “Mr. Charm” in Dynamis tonight.

I mentioned they were doing FoV pages when they invited me. We decide to try a harder page in hopes that 3 people can make it work instead of 2 (sound theory usually). It might have worked, but finding a safe camp wasn’t really working in our favor. A safe camp is an area where no aggressive monsters roam, close enough to your prey to make pulling viable but out of linking range with their brother monsters. Not to mention the minor fact that Opo-opos (monkeys) are a royal pain in the ass, having very high evasion (our /dancers are a couple levels off from having the Evasion Down move of dancer yet), dispel, and a couple nasty debuffs (poison, etc). We all die multiple times just trying to get clear of them so we can cancel the FoV page. We could probably handle them now that Mousie got level 40, but not last night at 38...

In any event, we decide to go with page 2 instead. Now for whatever reason, SE put Mandys on page 2 with wasps and Goblins and lizards on page 1. Goblins and lizards are harder (and higher level)than Mandys but lower than wasps, just a bit strange the way they set that up. Regardless, page 2 goes much better. In fact, my only complaint is that synced that low I have to use consumable items for stealth; luckily my alchemy is high enough that I can make my own fairly reasonably. Despite a few bumps in the road (links, agro) we eventually do manage to win a few of these pages. Mousie and Usul both leveled at least once (although Mousie ended the night dead while she was AFK), and I reached level 55. Now this was weird too; I needed 90 XP to reach level and got exactly 90 on our last kill. When I logged last night my XP was listed as 0. I don’t think I’ve seen that happen in about 5 years.