Book 6
40 + levels in 30 days

Welcome back. We have a lot of ground to cover this week, so kick back and a grab a beer.
Last week I was 33rd level and I’ve gone up to 41 at this point, so we’re gonna start with a little check up here.

You were born on 04/25/01 16:07:12.
(Yes, I’m one month old today, as I write this)

You have played for 7d 17h 48m 13s.
(No, I don’t have a life…7 days played in a 30 day period is a bit much, isn’t it?)

You've died 76 times.
(In order to appreciate one’s life, one must acknowledge his own mortality)

Level 41 Adventurer

Stats:
Strength: 125
Endurance: 120
Coordination: 10
Quickness: 65
Focus: 195
Self: 195
Health: 125
Stamina: 185
Mana: 240

Specialized Skills:
Life Magic: 240
Loyalty: 103
War Magic: 240

Trained Skills:
Appraise Item: 213
Item Enchantment: 215
Jump: 73
Magic Defense: 130
Mana Conversion: 165
Run: 120
Staff: 50


Ok, first things first. Lets start with the obvious…

My Magic skills have been the highest priority to raise. I still need to do a dump into Item. I’m living with level 5 banes, but they work fairly well with the level 6 life protects. My fizzle rate on level 6 life spells is down to about 15%-20%. Not too bad.
Mana Con needs a bit of attention as well, but I’m currently converting level 5's about 80% of the time, level 6 war and life convert approximately 40-50% of the casts. I’m happy with this for now, but my next level will probably wind up split between item and mana con. Once I have level 6 item spells under my belt, and the ability to convert the mana for them consistently, then I’ll move my war and life up to a base of 250.
I’m also considering raising my health up to 150, however for now it seems to be working out ok.

I haven’t put a single point into Coordination yet. As far as I’m concerned I have no use for it, the only skills it affects are Staff and Jump. If I wanted to beat things with a blunt object I’d play a melee. Sooner or later I’ll need a higher jump skill, so eventually I’ll raise it, but for now I’m still focusing on my magic. If a quest comes along where I need to jump I can always pump it up some, but for now I haven’t been questing much…I’m on a quest for the godhood that comes with level 50.

My loyalty is 103 now. I’m pledged to Creeps, to a real life friend of mine, (he happens to be pledged to my UA) and he doesn’t have the time to play nearly as much as I do. Since I hunt more, I now always pass up a good share of xp, insuring that he’ll make xp so our levels don’t spread too far apart. I’ve passed up over 3 million xp now, so the way I figure it, he owes me a few beers.

Magic Defense…Ok, so I’m dumping xp into a “broken” skill…regardless, on the rare occasion that I fight a few drudges, they are much easier now that I resist them about 50% of the time.



Events

The bulk of this past week has of course been spent leveling…and leveling…and leveling.
It’s become an obsession, I must train creature. I’m hunting around the various tusker camps in the dires, and I’ve adjusted my sleep schedule so that I can take advantage of them while they are un-camped. I’ve continued my commitment to making at least 1 level everyday and it’s getting progressively harder to keep up with that. Now that I’m in my 40’s, the xp needed to level is much more than before, yet I’m hunting the same creatures in the same area, so I’ve had to try to hone my technique at killing the monkeys. The faster I kill them, the faster they re-spawn, and I can make more experience. When I started hunting these camps, I was draining until they were down to ¼ health and then finishing with war. Now when I find myself surrounded by 5-6 tuskers I’m getting away from draining. My standard practice now is to open up with war and a vuln on the closest, and I can kill it before it gets to me. At this point 4 tuskers will be surrounding me, instead of going back to draining, I turn to vuln each tusker 1 at a time, and then open up with war, killing each one in approximately 3 hits. I only drain once my health drops down to about 50. The problem is if I get resisted, I’m going to the lifestone, but 9 out of 10 times it works fine, and it’s been the difference between making 150k per buff cycle and now making about 300-400k per cycle. Nice improvement I gotta say. Blowing **** up is definitely the faster way to kill these bastages.

Prime Time

I’m now at the point that I don’t bother hunting during prime playing hours. If I don’t make AT LEAT 600k xp an hour, then I feel like it’s not worth being logged on. Well, I figured out a few things to do with these times. I made my run up to the Essence of Strife, via the northen Point portal, near hebian, and now have all of the Level 7 War Bolts in my spellbook. It’s quite cool. When standing around the essence you the message , “The essence of Strife pulses with barely contained power! At the edge of your sight, you see images of war.”
When you turn in a scroll “The Essence of Strife floods the area with crimson light, rewarding those who have given it tribute” and the spell is then entered into your spellbook.

Since I was in the northern mountains, I also took the time to run for the beach fort and pick up some more diamond scarabs. Luckily I haven’t been burning them recently, but it can never hurt to have a few extras, so I have 11 on me now.

My first quest

My allegiance went for the Focusing Stone a few nights ago. This was my first foray into questing with my buds, since rolling up Trendkill. It was a lot of fun, and now i have a useless glowing rock taking up pack space until I can actually use it around 50th level.
'nuff said.

A funny thing happened on the way to Ayan Baqur

I recently had an old friend from Thistledown, Plagued, move from Thistledown to Wintersebb. (He’s also started a BM) He recently hit 20th level, and wanted a ride to Ayan so he could take advantage of the higher selling rates, as well as to hunt the coastline nearby. I happily sent my UA to tie to the Panopticon Complex and provided him with a portal. We were running from the dungeon to town, and I stopped to kill some drudges that were blocking his route.
Of course I was un-buffed, they were only stalkers, so it shouldn’t have been a problem…that is until my link went red. By the time the lag died down, I was at the lifestone, short 8 master robes and 350k pyreals. (Yep, I stopped buying notes. Why lose money on the note conversion when you can just load a pack or 2.) I sent Plagued the coords for the AB stone and he made it fine, so I set out to find my body. I ran down the hill to the east in the direction of my body, and stopped to scroll up and check the body’s coords. While stopped, a Harrower and 2 Virulents spawned on me. This isn’t a problem for my UA, so he quickly killed them. Guess what the Harrower dropped?
That’s right... A Vial of Organic Acid. Lotus held the corpse open while I alt-tabbed and logged in Trendkill on my other account (God Bless dual logging). As soon as I had TK logged in, I heard a scream…when dual-logged, the sounds from both accounts can be heard at all times, regardless of which account is in the back-ground.
It seems the harrower had re-spawned almost instantly and was beating the living hell out of Lotus, so I alt-tabbed back to his screen, healed and began attacking the new harrower, while still holding the corpse with the acid open. Having “repeat attacks” selected, I alt-tabbed back to Trendkill and portalled back to Ayan, all the while listening to Lotus kill the griever in the background. By the time TK got to Ayan, the 2nd griever was dead and I had Lotus Dragon release the corpse with the acid so TK could loot it. I’ve said it before, but I gotta say it again. God Bless Dual-Logging.

A funny thing happened on the way to a tusker camp

Ok, so I died earlier today, it happens. I was running back to get my body when my link went red. (Are you getting a sense of Deja-Vu here?)
Ok, when the link went back to green, I was in portal space. Great, another death!! Arghh!! I didn’t even wait to land at the lifestone, I just went downstairs and cracked open a beer. These lag issues are getting old.
Well, when I came back upstairs, it turns out I didn’t die after all. There I was standing before a large blue CRYSTAL, which just happened to be HUMMING. That’s right…I didn’t die, I lagged through the randomly spawning Humming Crystal Portal. Hmm…No time like the present. I applied the acid to my Peculiar Old Dagger “You Gingerly pour the purid acid over the dagger. Centuries of encrusted filth are burned away, revealing a glittering crystal key!”
“The glittering key fits neatly into the niche of the humming crystal. The hum grows louder for a moment, and the key reshapes itself before your eyes…” This transformed the key into a Lyceum Recall Gem.

Now I really need to hit 50th level. I want that damn armor so bad that I can taste it. Now that I have the gem on me, I know as soon as I hit a 320 war Skill, all I have to do is double click the gem and go get the pieces of my armor.

Life is good.

Original Post : The Trendkill Diaries Book 6- Life is Good