So much has happened, I’m a little off-balanced by it. It’s all GREAT stuff, but when I post about it, I want to do it right. Unfortunately, my procrastination has thus far kept me from emailing myself the screenshots. That may be the biggest drawback to PS3 FFXI…

So, I’ve finally returned after nearly a year away from Vana’diel. The reason for my departure was the steady breakdown in performance I had been experiencing from my PC which could only be attributed to general system degradation. The solution came in the form of the PS3’s PlayStation Store offering virtual PS2 HDD drivers and Blackmutoh and Lilboobookitty sending me the disks I needed to get things rolling again.I no longer have to pay $260 a year to maintain the forums either, as Lilboobookitty has moved them to Devilutionaries.com. So that’ll help with replacing my computer within the coming year.

To be honest with you though, there was a much more important factor that lead to my loss of interest in FFXI.

Reeroo never came back.

Klaive waited faithfully for over six months before finally accepting that she would never return. Klaive without Reeroo was like a Ninja without shihei. He was utterly broken. Her departure decimated him utterly, and it left me feeling apathetic towards FFXI overall.

It took several months for my mindset to change and for Klaive to be liberated from the burden of his loss. He’ll always miss Reeroo, and I’ll always miss playing him when he was with her… but time has healed his wounds and the time to move on has come.

Since I’ve returned, I’ve become acquainted with some of the new members of the linkshell including Nadjaa, Shallon, Peepers, Dracian, Biwo, and others. I was also reunited with old favorites such as Blackmutoh, Talondalus, Eggmantash (henceforth referred to as Eggm), and Drahgoness. I also caught a glimpse of Mikichan and Lilredd.

I’ve also been pretty active since getting back, having fully merited Critical Strikes, and attained 2/4 Spell Interrupt rate down.

My greatest accomplishment since my return, however, took place shortly after this screenshot was taken (on my PS3.)

Can you guess what it was? Yeah, that’s right…

I finally got Fenrir! I ran in there and showed him that he was my BITCH. ^^ When I defeated him, I held my head in dominance and he bowed before my superior balls as I drank his beer in front of him and his peers.

I’m looking forward to the Wings of the Goddess expansion now and am currently trying to prepare myself for the release of the new jobs. It is my hope to choose one as I did with Blue Mage and run with it up to post-60. Even 75 if no limitations are presented as they were with Blue Mage.

We’re in the process of building a Rise of the Zilart and a Chains of Promathia static out of the Linkshell, and maybe outsourcing some other people for it. We’ve already cleared the promies, and I won’t be doing any of them again for any reason. So, we’d only be looking for people who have accomplished that as well.

Anyway, look forward to future updates and feel free to comment. ^^

It’s been a long time since I’ve posted because so much has been happening and I have gone through a lot.  More than I think I can ever express through a blog.  I have a ton of screenshots that I’m going to post (I took them just for this blog,) but I just can’t manage to do it tonight.

So… where to begin…

Well, Reeroo had to cancel her FFXI account due to billing issues.  She had some financial emergencies arise and everything had to be cut back.  So, Klaive is waiting for her February – March return to Vana’diel.  It actually came at an interesting time because I had been reaching the point where I was having less and less time to play.  I haven’t done any meriting yet, but I’ve been playing most nights with Blackmutoh and Darkpath, doing besieged and kicking ass.

AlphaMalevolent’s discernment reached “Average” and he learned both the “Gallop” ability and the “Auto-Regen” ability, so at day 70 (69 was my last report,) I have him slowly working his stamina back up.  I’m quite proud of my bird. 

Blackmutoh maxed out his sword (finally) and I tweaked my build for maximum damage without merits or god gear, so that’s cool.

I’ve settled on a new schedule and will now be playing FFXI on most weekdays from 2:30pm – 9:00pm PST, which should give me more time rather than ending up with me being exhausted before I even start playing.  And since I’ll start in the afternoon, I’ll avoid the frigid factor which has been leading me to lie down in my bed “for just a few minutes” and subsequently passing out when I should be playing.

Black, Darkpath, and I have been doing our low to mid-20s static… my paladin is 25 now and I upgraded from beetle +1 to chain +1.  I can’t wait til 31 when I can use my kampf set and really kick ass.

I’ve been writing a lot… but random stuff more than one actual story.  I’ve been learning that my mind is more depraved than even I ever knew before.

Tonight, I went out to eat and had delicious pad thai and a few Aku Akus to drink… so I’m basically ready to go to bed as I write this.  I can’t think of anything else to say at the moment, but I’m sure there’s something I’m forgetting.  Bah.

Anyway… night.

I haven’t posted anything in a while because, quite honestly, there’s nothing to post.  I got my 60GB PS3 and my Wii… but as far as FFXI is concerned, it’s been pretty dead.  I did Besieged a few times with Blackmutoh and Darkpath.  Reeroo logged on and we staticed our low level jobs once for about 2-3 hours.  Mainly, Reeroo’s been playing WoW.  She plays FFXI less and less.  All the more reason to hate WoW more than I already do, I suppose.  So… I log on every morning at 3:00am and wait for her.  She hasn’t showed up this week.  Maybe she’ll log on tonight.  It’s like camping a Notorious Tarutaru.

The Linkshell’s not very active lately.  I haven’t been doing much to help maintain activity, but I don’t really care at this moment in time.  We’re going to start doing Promy runs for those who haven’t completed it yet through the whole month of December.  I don’t really want to do it since I finished my promies… but I told Blackmutoh that I’d help him catch up and if it helps our CoP Static get underway, then I’m all for it.

Darkpath, Maleficus, and Reeroo all wanted to be a part of the CoP Static.  With me and Black, that’d be 5/6.  But all of them need Promies, and Reeroo isn’t logging on much anymore… I’m a SMN.  Blackmutoh will be a SMN.  Darkpath’s a RNG.  Reeroo’s a WAR/NIN.  Which means… we need another WAR/NIN and a WHM.  Maleficus could probably do the WAR/NIN job without a problem.

And a 30+ WHM shouldn’t be hard to find… right?

Anyway, I’m working on the outline for my new book.  The premise is beautiful.  Truly an astounding concept if I do say so myself.  I just hope I can do it justice.

Well, I had best be getting back to my existence.

Later.

So I finally beat FFXII yesterday. Wow. Best Final Fantasy yet. Fran is mega-hawt, the hidden bosses were like HNMs from FFXI, and the story was superb. I adored the battle system as well. Pretty much everything was an improvement. My only complaints were a) the menu-based airship because I like to fly around freely and b) the way chocobos were so nasty and mean throughout the game. They were almost depicted as pests or vermin at times and actually appeared as enemies occasionally.

Anyway… I’m all done now, so the time for my return to Vana’diel is at hand. Except it’s Sunday, and I just woke up, and all my business is taken care of. Reeroo won’t be on until 3:00am my time, and Blackmutoh is working on getting his girl connected, so besides meriting for the first time, there’s not much for me to do. So right now… I’ve decided to actually PLAY Dragon Warrior VIII: Journey of the Cursed King. I bought it on the day it came out… in 3 days, that’ll be one year ago. I bought it because it had a playable demo of FFXII. XD

I played the demo and ignored the game, but have heard it’s really good. Luckily for Vana’diel, this is just a time killer for times I’ll spend seeking a Merit party or days when no one’s on and I don’t care to be on either. It’s not something I need to take a break for.

So anyway… to catch you all up on what happened in FFXI…

Reeroo and I spent some time together on Wednesday or Thursday, can’t remember which. She decided to level Bard, so I crafted her a Maple Harp +1.

Then she serenaded me in West Ronfaure.

And then on Friday, I check on AlphaMalevolent and guess what?

Strength: FIRST-CLASS!

That’s right! Woo hoo! Now it’s time to work on his Discernment so I can teach him “The Story of an Impatient Chocobo.” Unfortunately, that drops stamina like MAD. So… I hope I don’t lose his tail. At any rate, I’m going to do my best to teach him two stories, then I’m going to set him back to carrying packages. That’ll raise his stamina back up as high as possible before he has to be retired.

I want him to be the best quality riding chocobo possible. Which means he needs to know Gallop for damn sure.

I’m still feeding him vomp carrots though, because I want his stamina to have all the help it can get in staying high enough to keep that tail.

Anyway, that’s mostly all I have to say for today… back to my game. I’ll post again later and update everyone on my FFXI progress!

On the last day of September, Blackmutoh and I hit level 70. We made a promise that sometime in October, we would attain level 75. When midnight, October 31st arrived, it found us only level 74 with 15,000-ish EXP to go. Unfortunately, it also found Blackmutoh with a level 36 BLM subjob and he refused to level to 75 while gimped. Thus, he began to seek parties with his BLM and struggle in vain to hit 37.

I went to bed.

At 3:00am I woke up with my alarm clock blaring. “Reeroo!” was the first thought that popped into my head. Eagerly, I logged onto FFXI and waited for her.

Soon, she was there, bounding right up to her Elvaan (yep, that’s me), and hopping enthusiastically into my lap. I was whole again.

We talked for a while and, finding that Blackmutoh had given up and logged out, and that Darkpath was occupied, we opted to call off static and I’d powerlevel her Level 5 Beastmaster. To Ghelsba Outpost we went! She was so tiny! Just look!

We got her 5 levels in 2 hours… from 5 to 10. I got very sleepy though and was forced to say goodnight. I collapsed into bed and awoke at 9am with a start. Rushing into the shower and hastily getting dressed, I felt my excitement building. Today was the day. No, not Halloween. Yes, Halloween is my favorite holiday, but this was even more important… more vital… more significant.

This way the day Final Fantasy XII launched in America.

I arrived at GameStop and claimed my Collector’s Edition game with its cool metal case, and my Limited Edition BradyGames guide, which I doubt I’ll ever use… I just collect them. ^^ I was a bit hungry, so I hit Quizno’s and had a Prime Rib & Peppercorn sandwich, and headed back home.

When I arrived, Blackmutoh was logged onto the game and asked me to call him. I did so and found that he was partying with BLM. I proceeded to play the intro of FFXII and feel quite impressed with Square-Enix’s latest accomplishment. However, before I could really get involved in it, Blackmutoh leveled up to 37!

Time to party! …or was it?

No WHMs were seeking! And the only possible healer was a Japanese SMN who was AFK anyway! orz

But lo and behold, as we stood there wondering what to do… the undead swarm began to march towards Al Zahbi. We rushed to the bastion to defend the Astral Candescence. My second ever Level 6 besieged. ^^

So we get 1080 exp when we win, and begin trying to form a party. Now get this… Blackmutoh and I have been staticing since before level 60… we’ve tried hard to keep our exp points close and always delighted in leveling up at the same time. I was 8 exp ahead of him, and then I died and got an R3, so I was roughly 200 behind him. I soloed to catch up in Kuftal Tunnel and figured I was back near where I was before I died, so I stopped.

Our experience was now IDENTICAL. For the first time ever.

We formed a party… dealt with an intentionally DCing NIN, A JP SMN Main Healer, and some asshole Samurai… but finally, it happened.

I equipped my Walahra Turban and began working on my buffer. I didn’t quite get a full buffer before the party disbanded. I then visited the Nomad Moogle near Maat and got the key item for Meriting. The Promise was kept. And now… finally… I’m going to play Final Fantasy XII.

御休み為さい！

Today began on a rather interesting note. It seems I’ve been a bit too caring towards AlphaMalevolent, because he has begun to act very spoiled. He was prancing around the stable, snorting and headbutting people, and being a general nuisance.

Having never encountered this sort of behavior before, I followed the only advice they gave me and proceeded to scold him.

Of course, after he hung his head in shame, I felt really bad and had to make it up to him. So I decided to take him for a long walk. I tossed him some vomp carrots and started our journey out to Jugner Forest. Upon arrival, we encountered another chocobo, Melody. AlphaMalevolent quickly befriended her.

After leaving him alone with his new-found lover, I traveled to Jeuno to rendezvous with my own.

Reeroo and I spent a while together, talking and cuddling and things of the sort. She was being very adorable in her little witch’s hat, and I had been missing her all weekend. I was very happy to be spending some time with my girl, and the second she ran up to me and hopped in my lap, everything stopped sucking and everything was once again right in the world.

We headed out to Rolanberry Fields and did some bazaar shopping. After several fruitless minutes of browsing, we sat together on the grass and just forgot the world together. It was just me and my little butterfly, the way I like it. ^^

Speaking of which, check this out:

So I cuddled my girl some more, kissed her little toes, all the usual stuff… until she had to go. ; ;

Well… Blackmutoh had been wanting to get Savage Blade for a while, so we decided to form a WSNM party and beat the stupid monster.

This is Savage Blade by the way:

So we got 10 people together, and Blackmutoh had a terrible crashing, breaking, shattering, expensive merchandise disaster of an accident at his house and had to go AFK. So we all did Teleport-Altep and he caught up just after by Outpost Warping. We then began our arduous trek to activate the four pillars that open the accursed Altepa Gate by being very confused from the beginning, having poor communication, and going in 20 different directions at once (Yes, that’s two different directions per person.) Eventually, we managed to gather together at the gate with three switches activated and less than 15 minutes left before the switches reset again. By now, the ONLY WHITE MAGE had given up and warped back to Whitegate. When asked “WTF?,” he responded that he’d return if there was some order.

I told him to get his ass out here and stop being a dumbass or to GTFO of my alliance.

He barely made it to the gate in time.

We zoned into the advanced section of the cave, killed a Notorious Monster of some sort, and proceeded to clear the spawn room of Anticans. When the time came, Blackmutoh clicked the ??? and spawned Girtablulu, which was a big bad scorpion… which died in 30 seconds. Over an hour spent in utter confusion, running around in the desert and waiting on hopeless high-level n00bs to catch up… and we beat the damn scorpion in 30 seconds. -_-

Blackmutoh and I were victorious!

After comparing AlphaMalevolent to a Galka’s Destrier on the way home, I came to appreciate my chocobo’s tail much more than ever before.

Blackmutoh got Savage Blade finally, completing his quest, and I gave him the gift of a Guespiere, which he really seemed to appreciate… though he had been hoping to obtain a Wing Sword. He explained he wants to get the Wing Sword on his own though, so I felt pretty good about the gift. After that, we traveled to Kuftal Tunnel and experimented with Savage Blade. We discovered that following Asuran Fists with Savage Blade creates Fragmentation. ^^ And that’s the new skillchain for duoing, it seems.

All in all, it was a very productive day… and maybe it’s not even over yet! ^^ I hope to get to 75, but with Final Fantasy XII coming out tomorrow, I don’t know how realistic it is to hope for that. I guess we’ll see. ^^

So, I finally got my room completely clean. I have more to do tomorrow, but I finished my work tonight and decided to log onto the game.

I checked in on my dear and beloved chocobo, AlphaMalevolent at the stables, and heard the report on how he delivered packages again today.

That was your typical, run-of-the-mill report. Nothing unusual. And then… it happened!

He grew up! So I fed him a couple of Vomp Carrots, changed his care plan to include nothing but delivering messages, took him for a Long Walk, registered him to ride, tossed him a Chocolixer, and read him the Story of an Impatient Chocobo about 8 times before he was exhausted again.

I then told everyone on the Linkshell about my new grown up Destrier, and Darkpath was nearby so I decided to introduce the two of them.

It was lots of fun getting to see my first exotic Chocobo in action. Darkpath liked him, too. I think it’s safe to say that AlphaMalevolent has made a new friend.

AlphaMalevolent’s Statistics

Strength: Average

Endurance: Average

Discernment: Poor

Receptivity: Poor

Affection: Regards me as a Parent