Diary of Tokugawa the Mage, Part XIV - Aerlinthe Island
Part XIV – Quests and Aerlinthe Island


My RL job exploding around me I did not have much time for AC during June and July, meaning that during that time I had one hour of playtime in the early AM and a few PM hours here and there but nothing to really do some serious leveling either off Tuskers or in the OP. The few days I had for a few hours of continous playtime I used to do some of the higher level AC quests like Shen, Hieromancer Hall, Focus Stone and of course exploring Aerlinthe Island, although I never got to do the quest, but I am on the list!!!

Shendolain was arranged by my allegiance and it was a blast, of course with a LvL96 FourSchooler, a LvL75 Og and a LvL52 BM (myself) forming the upmost front, killing everythin in sight leaving not much left for the following melees. Another LvL 80 FourSchooler did the levers. Lots of high level undead, skeletons and of course some Vapor Golems, like the ones in the Mage Lyceum. Well they could have all been drudges, that’s how long they lasted. In such a large group it is just incredible, I think the worst my health got was close to 120, that was when we three frontrunners ran across a bridge and into four Vapor Golems. Overall a great quest, can recommend it to everyone here and I will do it again anytime. I decided not to get the orb as I think it is a joke, I got a shield for my UA, a great shield BTW and I actually killed myself in order to transfer it to him. Never thought I would actually do that some day. The Shen shield is probably the best quest item I currently own. Not the coolest one, that is definitely the Hieromancer Orb I traded for a Tiny in Subway as I did not get one in the Lyceum, despite camping the Vapors there for hours and killing tons of em.

The Hieromance Hall was actually quite easy, we did it with two mages, myself and my LvL75 Og patron, his LvL80 Four School friend was our level team, just there for opening the doors. Key for this is either to have a large group or to ran past all the bandies and other nasties inside and have someone reliable open the doors just in time when you need it. I killed some bandies, umbris and golems in there, nothing too bad, buffed my skills up to 328 war and needed about ten stones overall to kindle the three armor pieces to have an Exarch Mage Armor. So you can do this with two other high level mages, or you can go in a group just killing everything along the way, your choice.

The Focus Stone Quest is another great one for the graduated BMs to do, you can solo the dungeon to get your skull of the high Acolyte, just remember just one skull is needed for the whole group. This was actually a kindoff chaotic quest as we took a wrong way, much to the dismal of our leader who was doing the levers and instructing the rest of us where to go. But we did ok, finished the first part and got the raw stone. Then we all met, buffed up and ran to the lava pit, if you jump in right at the wall you will avoid wakening the magam golems in the pit, we were able to avoid that, got through without a problem, killing a few undeads and one magma golem along the way. When we were in the room where you create the focus stone I was actually looking where to go next – well no, that was it, done, over, finished. Got the stone, great out of there, and then what – the great disappointment, the stone takes off 50 mana……! I feel like this impairs me too much in my fighting, I am used to 340 mana, but I use the stone when I fight Corals because they resist me quite a bit and the four points in all magic skills helps that, also easier to handle a few corals with 290 mana then ten Tuskers.


Getting to Aerlinthe is a real pain, especially if you are as cheap as I am and do not want to spend a D-note. The run over the drunken madmans tower throught the walled portals to Calcimere Fortress is easy, there is a LS right outside the Fortress, I actually changed my ties for Aerlinthe, now I am portal tied to the Ayan Baishi portal and LS tied to the LS at Calcimere. That helps me getting from Baishi via web maze everywhere else, maybe I should tie to the Sub, will think about that.

Anyway, I will stop rambling and go on. You need to buff up well for the run into Calcimere, and you need to be able to jump. I buff with all VI life protects plus Impen & blodg bane VI on armor and underclothes. Well I aint no jumper, so that was out. I found a nice trick around it. Run to the Fortress entrance, there is the locked entrance portal. Click on the portal to mark it and run around it to the side, now press “R” on your keyboard, the AI will think you are behind the portal and…..open it yeah!!! Sounds easy, well it aint, while you operate the portal to open, two diamonds and a bunch of bandies take about 100 helth points from you, despite all buffs, so just run in as fast as you can, then I always give the undead dude the C-note and run past him to the end of the fortress so the diamonds do not catch me, Heal Self VI, dodge some spells, undead dude has opened the portal, run back and use the portal – you made it to Aerlinthe!!!!!

That was the easy part. In Aerlinthe you need to decide what you want to do, Corals only or everything else. For Corals I buff like for the run into Calcimere, for everything else I use all Life VI protects, Impen VI on clothes and underclothes, all VI banes on clothes. Off we go. Corals are with 320 war buffed still a problem, resisting my magic yield 50%, once I land that one I am ok, vuln and shock wave VI times 2-3 and Coral is history. I also like to drain em for health and stamina, works well, the resist is the problem, I belive that you cannot hunt them reliably until life/war is above 330, the focus stone should help quite a bit with that, and of course the Exarch plate…….That’s at least what I thought. Iused the Exarch to buff my war by 10 points, buffed as usual and went for the corals, first one hits me for 120 hp, twice and I am outa there. OP BSD, getting rid of vitae, back to Calcimere, buffin, running, door opening, dodging, through portal, back in Aerlinthe. That was painful. Now I did something stupid, I went again to recover my body, thinking I missed a buff I buffed now with EVERYTHING and again the y got me, this time I lost my Exarch plate. I was pissed, got rid of the vitae, and recovered the bodies in a robe, this time I was able to kill five corals along the way. I nearly got killed by corals a third time while using the Exarch armor, so I asked around and nobody has seen that before, they all seem to do fine in the Exarch. I for my part do not use it anymore. Especially if I actually can loose it. I also decided to avoid corals until my skills are up to par. I now hunt at a spot right behind the bridge to the Shimena Keep. Vapors (LvL367) and lotsa shrethts and banderlings around there to kill, good loot (peas) and XPs, so I like it to make some XPs and money. For pure PL-ing, meaning most XPs per hour, I am afraid to say until you can camp Corals Tusker camps are your best bet, even after LvL 50. That is sad. But once you can hit Corals reliably, nothing beats that XP, one guy went within one week frm LvL 60-78 on Corals, of course 24/7 gameplay and no life….



The Conclusion:

So here I am, a close to LvL53 Battlemage on Leafcull, I am sitting at work today writing this little report while my wife is doing THE quest with our allegiance tonight and will probably get her black atlan stone and Aerfalls pallidum, Life sucks at times. But I am hopeful that my RL workload will decrease, leaving me time to level Tokugawa the Mage to LvL70 within the next two months. Then I can pick up leadership at LvL 70 which will allow me to get him into one of our XP chains which will level him for me, leaving me more time for the fun things, like quests and the island.

This diary is with fourteen parts quite a large one and I was planning on ending it with Part XIV, as I think I have nothing more to add that would help out a young and rising BM in his endeavors. Your comments are welcomed and I am more than willing to continue this in whatever format Dizz and the community deem appropriate.


Strength & Honor, may Lord Asheron look favorably upon your path!



Tokugawa

Tokugawa the Mage, FourSchool Battlemage at Leafcull under Digimagus in the Empyrean Guard


Original Post : Diary of Tokugawa the Mage, Part XIV - Aerlinthe Island