The Christmas Gift (to Sanna)

[Sanna]

I'm really good at letting things sit and, um... ferment. Ask my about my jury summons... or the container of what used to be canned peas in the fridge... or Christmas thank-you notes...

So, this is simultaniously Another Chapter in the Saga of Sanna, and a thanks to Kiztent ^_^.


Christmas day. I have a SPIFFY new thinscreen monitor, and for the first time in five semesters, my entire keyboard fits on the desk. So I get on EQ to test it out. Things look pretty (**** mouse/video lag is STILL THERE, tradeskills sucks with a soft mouse like this o_0). Kiztent is in channel, apparently 3-boxing the SK, the shm, and the druid. And he says....

"65 is so boring. All you have left to do is pharm AAs." (or something to that effect. but the word 'boring' was definately linked to '65'.)

I /glare at him and say, "come down here and join the lvl 34s again." He declines. Then I get this tell.

stormhammer.Kiztent tells you, "Wanna be uber for a day?"
You tell stormhammer.Kiztent, "haha sure"
stormhammer.Kiztent tells you, "No, really, I'm serious."
You tell stormhammer.Kiztent, "um.... ok, then."


We establish a 'common password', and he temporarily lets me access the druid, the level 65 druid with a bazillion (193 at the time) AAs... and LDoN on the account.

I'm floored. I'm boggled. I'm logging into Stormhammer.

And I'm gonna go on an LDoN.

This chick's spellbook is frigging complete (and a mess and he won't let me organize it!! /cry). If I want to cast any druid spell, I can. She has AAs Iroke will spend the next five months dreaming about (as Sanna does her homework and doesn't play). And don't get me started on the gear, the gear makes me want to cry. She has 355 wis. That hammer can proc a 1500 dd. It's from Time.

So right as I get the UI set up properly and start dealing with hotkeys, Kiz is like, "Bo9 and FoE, and port to Ro." Did I mention I was going on an LDoN? Aaaa I can cast Blessing of the Nine! Omgosh omgosh omgosh I feel like a leet druid. For the time being.... I AM a leet druid.

We port through a few zones, Kiz talks to some NPCs, I just follow him, then he says, 'zone in here'. Oooooh LDoN.

Most of the ones I've done now have been collections. Sometimes they go fast, sometimes the drops take for-frigging-ever. Once we did a kill 56 and we alllllmost won (would have if I had hit Exodus a bit faster, doh!) YAY for Kiztent, now I have 'tested' LDoNs.

My end opinion is: I see why people like them. A controlled area with a specific goal and a certain time frame. No respawns. Get points for winning, buy nice items with the points. BUT: I am still content not having bought it. Aside from the camping problems on Sullon, I'm still working my way through Velious content. To me, LDoN is/would be a distraction. And...

A trap. When I'm in a 'normal' zone, even if I'm with friends, and I get tired, I can say, 'hey, i'm tired, let's go soon.' And we finish up in short order, and go. In an LDoN, you HAVE to finish. You can't leave. If an emergency comes up (one of my guildie's grandfather died one day), or if you just suddenly realize that you have to go to class or something, you NEED to be able to just leave. Ok, that was an extreme example, but the point stands. To me, LDoN has the possibility of being too inflexible.



BUT:
I know this know. Thanks to the kind generosity of a good friend, I was able to try something to see if it suited me, without spending $30, $40, $60 that I don't necessarily have. This is not to say I wholly dislike LDoN adventures, or would never do one again. But I got to 'try before I buy' and I found that I'm rather content that I did not buy.


So all in all, I had a good Christmas.
Now, I just have to write my thank yous, deal with the jury summons, and, um, clean out the fridge...


/hugs Kiztent.

-- Sanna

[Nhin Impious]

If an emergency comes up (one of my guildie's grandfather died one day), or if you just suddenly realize that you have to go to class or something, you NEED to be able to just leave.

I heard the news that my grandmother was being rushed to the emergency room immediately before clicking "yes" to a rez from Phabos (me=level 15 ranger 'Enhar). I took the rez, zoned to safety, told him what was going on, and camped out. (Hey, it's a 45 minute drive, there was no way another 2 minutes would hurt). No problem.

If your groupmates are your friends, they'll understand a hurried explanation and make up for you if you have to leave. I've had dungeons where both of the tanks went LD and we ended up with ME (me=level 50ish cleric Nhinx) as the tank for a few minutes. If I had someone actually telling me what was wrong, I'd be able to make a decision whether to evac and take the loss or try to press on, and one loss isn't going to kill the group.

Anyways, for most folks, the kind of emergencies that would interrupt a scheduled 2-3 hour session of being online are pretty rare. Properly done, you won't "realize" that you have to go to class halfway through a dungeon, and not to make light of this kind of thing, but if you're losing your grandfather every time you go in a dungeon, maybe you ought to give the guy a HP buff.

Come to think of it, I'd have to say my grandmother was an Enchanter... which explains a lot.

Nhinx Aphsion
"You'll learn-- anything you don't have to cook tastes better." --Grandma B.
(edited to mention that I took the rez...I was upset, not stupid)

[Lilosh]

Wow.

Merry Christmas, apparently. :-)



It must be nice to be loved. *grin*


-Lilosh

[eniamn]

if i was given that option for a wizard i think i would have to try and ae some places with winds of gelid. well that and SoS a decaying skel. :evil

[Itek]

Coolness. Grats.

I'd never play on Sullon. (I personally don't like PvP.) And I've thought about Legends, but can't justify the cost having just gone back to college myself.

Level 65 is so completely different from... well everything else. Back last May Itek was 52 enc, and TheWife was 49 druid. We were thinking about how hard it was going to be doing the Kedge part of her epic.

Last month my 65 enchanter duo'ed the entire seahorse caves with her 53 druid. Just impossible to even think about 7 months and 13 levels before.

Starting a new semester I'm going to have to cut my play time down from 4-6 hours a day... to 12 hours a week.

LDoNs are great. But yeah, it can be scary saying "ok, unless the house or the computer catch fire I'm here for the next 2 hours."

[Sanna]

yeah, i've gone from saying, 'don't play on sullon unless you have really tough skin or are insane' to saying, 'you know, just stay the hell away. really.'

It wasn't a very 'kind/fun' server to play on, to begin with, then... Since August, the entire server has gone really wonky.
I was gonna type up a whole Soap Opera-y thing about how, but the whole guild-discussion is verboten here, isn't it. I think my 6th Lothay Lock came about because of that. Sullon was bad, now it's worse, so just stay away and let us spiral into self-destruction. ^_^


Oh yeah, and level 65s can kill level 6s.


If I had a job, I'd give serious thought to Legends. But I don't, so... Insanity for me. /shrug.

At least I have Tarew and Mithaniel to fall back upon ^_^. Now if they'd just fix this mouse lag issue so I can tradeskill on my own comp... o_0

-- Sanna

[kiztent]

I had posted a bit more detailed explanation of Sanna's 2 days of uberness (Christmas and New Year's) but the post got eaten.

Suffice to say, Sanna lost steam at 15/22 in her 4th LDoN of the day (1 slaughter, 3 collections, we tend not to do any others) and I had to talk to her to keep her going. But go she did and win we did (3 wins, 1 lesser reward), and I appreciate that

[Sanna]

bah. ^_^ i was tired before we ever even entered miragul's, but i gave it my best shot.

and then i logged and took a four hour nap (and would have slept through the night if not for the durn phone ^_^)


LDoNs are generally fun, yes, but so is the rest of EQ. And i'm still working on the rest of eq. But yesh, I am mucho happy for Kiztent's present ^_^

-- Sanna
the shift key is my friend