It was the best of weekends, it was the worst of weekends. Erh, wait that doesn't sound right...
Aesten made it to 51, which meant that he could put on his Boots of Flowing Slime that aunty Celeni and uncle Iluien had got for him (yes so he is twinked, so sue me
).
Did a few LDoN's on Saturday with some regular groupies, went like clockwork and we ammassed points and augs and had some cloak drop umpteen times. We all felt very smug and self satisfied.
Logged on on Sunday to find none of the usual crowd around, but being superbly confident, just clicked on LFG and headed off to Felwithe to re-stock with peridots. Sure enough a tell arrives, "want to join N Ro LDoN?" sure, just getting some dots, be right there.
Port over to N Ro to find the group leader is a Ranger. Now those of you who have known me a while, know my background and how long I persevered with Iluien, but sadly I have to say that these days when I see a Ranger joining the group my heart sinks.
Anyway the leader announces that he has a full group except someone for CC and is getting a Chanter. Someone says here's the Chanter, the sixth member joins and leader says he is getting the mission.
We all head off to Oasis to buff up and get ready. While getting ready a Shaman friend happens by and kindly buffs everyone (only mention this to add some color to what is about to unfold), we about to go in and I ask who is MA and who is pulling, a HP pissing contest breaks out for a few minutes and then the "Enchanter" says, "Erh, do you think I am an Enchanter? I'm a Wizard!".
Leader says "Oh, well no probs!"
In the meantime the warrior and ranger had sorted out that the ranger had more HP but the warrior had more AC and the ranger said he would pull and the warrior could tank. The group makeup was Ranger, Warrior, Monk, Monk, Wizzy, Cleric.
I whispered into the wind "if we do not have any CC I had better Paci for the puller" "I will assist the puller to target and paci on your request".
The only person who heard me apparently, was the wizzy.
We enter the dungeon. The first pull is a multiple and it happened before the wizzy had even cast his familiar.
We survived but I was already down to 50% mana. (I had KEI by the way, I don't usually bother chasing it, but when I saw that none of the regulars were on, the thought took me that I might strike a difficult group and the extra regen would be handy
.
So it went like this for a few minutes, The ranger would pull, always bringing back two or three, a free for all would break out with the ranger and warrior each doing their own thing and the monks either assisting or offtanking. My mana was disappearing like the bargains from post Christmas clearance sale. My blood pressure was going through the roof and the Wizzy had privately aggreed to mem evac.
By an amazing stroke of luck, a named mob appeared in one of the first few rooms. The leader didn't think to announce it of course and suddenly we were in pitched battle with the named its pet and a couple of its guards. Somehow we killed them all and survived, the wizzy did his enchanter impersonation and managed to keep a couple rooted and although I went oom and the wizzy was oom, we survived.
The named dropped a very nice 2 hand staff (Staff of sand sculpture, or something) decent dam/delay and excellent stats.
The leader said lets roll. Some debate began about who could use it. Wizzy and I passed. (Although it had good mana and HP as well as 10 Wis, I could not ever see myself using a 2 hander.)
The debate was now really getting hot, someone had suggested NBG, the leader said he really wanted that staff, one of the monks said, "you are a Ranger you will never use it" it went on and on.
The roll took place and the warrior won it.
The leader cursed and spluttered and tried to change the rules, everyone said the warrior won the roll it was his. Leader has a hissy fit and warrior loots the staff. Wizzy sends me a tell, "any more of this and I am gating".
We get back to business, ranger pulls another major multiple. I go out of mana trying to heal and the warrior dies, the leader calls run and every one runs and zones out. Wizzy gates out and quits the group.
The leader curses out the wizzy for being an idiot etc. We rez the warrior re-buff and decide to continue. (While sitting outside medding my Shaman friend happens by, asks how's it going, I told him that this was the wosrt group I had ever been with, he smiles and mumbles "bad luck" chackling as he walks away. I know I should have bailed, but I find it difficult to abandon people and some of the guys were trying to do it right.)
I now demand that if we are to continue, that the warrior tanks and everyone assists him. I asked the warrior to pull and I would pacify everything so that we got single pulls only.
We get back in and begin. Warrior then says that he has not done much pulling before.
I explain to the warrior how to target and I will assist to target his mob and paci. We paci three mobs, the warrior goes into the room and pulls out five mobs. The warrior and the monks die, I run back to the zone again.
The Ranger says, "see he is worse at pulling than me!"
I rezz the others and we decide to call it.
The Ranger then begins to berate the Warrior over the staff once again. I gated back to BB feeling rather shell shocked.
No this was not a level 20 group, this was a level 50 group.
While sitting dazed in BB an old warrior friend says lets get together and form a group at the same time we both get a tell from a stranger asking us to join him, so we decide that is easier than the rigmarole of recruiting and meet up with a BL and another warrior. Beastlord has himself as leader and recruits a Necro. At the same time a Bard friend of the warrior and me turns up and we get her into the group.
My warrior friend says to me, "this should be a pretty good group" And he should have been right.
We get the mission and head to Mistmoore. My old troll mate is to be MA and our Bard is puller. We buff up and head in.
We then strike the most aggro laden dungeon I've encountered for a long time. Our Bard is a good puller, I have done many missions with her and never had any worries, but this time she was having real troubles.
But it was made many times worse by the second warrior not assisting. He constantly taunted the mob off the MA. The BL would not postion his pet properly and even though the MA would move right back into the cleared room to make it obvious where the Bard was pulling to, the mobs would never make it there because the BL and other warrior were constantly engaging the mobs in the doorway.
Needless to say I was rapidly running out of mana again.
Well we got a massive overpull, the Necro was standing in the wrong spot and went down like a sack of spuds. The Bard likewise. In both cases sup heal landed as the corpse hit the floor. I was tearing my hair out. We had to run to zone.
Went back in and rezzed the Bard and Necro.
Next few pulls went normal, except the warrior kept taking aggro and I was being driven crazy trting to keep everyone alive.
About this time I noticed that the Necro didn't have a pet. I asked him if he was out of bone chips? No reply.
Well, of course we got another horendous pull, Bard died again, Warrior died again, and this time I died as well.
Now this is the first time I have died in a very long time, it was also the first time any of my "good" group mates had ever died with me clericing. I was not feeling very happy.
I ran back from BB got in and rezzed the bard and re-equipped myself and began to med. Leader says "we can still do this" and technically he was right, there was enough time left if we did not stuff around. Then I realise that only the BL and MA had got out alive and there were four people to rez. I said we should rez after and just get on with it, but the leader insisted that I rez everyone, so the time was blown on rezzing and medding.
As we began what was to be the last pull, my curiosity got he better of me and I asked the Necro if he could cast a pet. He says sure and casts one. [:boggle:] At that point we get booted from the dungeon. I don't think the Necro did any CC, no pet, just nuked for the entire mission.
Two losses in a row after weeks of never missing a win
Well, just to wash the bad taste out of our mouths, my troll mate and I decided to have one last go before logging off, we managed to convince our Bard mate to join us again - but she absolutely refused to pull
and we gathered up a SK regular another Ranger and I cannot for the life of me remember who the sixth was.
The mission went like clockwork, The SK pulled and tanked, the Bard CCed, everyone assisted properly, even the ranger managed to stay behind the mob most of the time :P
So 150 PP in dots, two losses and one regained level later I pocketed 40 PP and logged off feeling rather empty.
PS... Just to prove that she could do it, Celeni later went and kited a few cragbeast around Nitimbi, had to get that winning feeling back somehow
Edited, Sun Feb 29 21:04:59 2004 by Iluien
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