A reckless adventure

Part of me doesn't want to post this because I feel it's boastful but, at the same time, I'm overjoyed at what happened last night and I want to share it.

Yesterday was a day of fun at the sandbox. I pretty much spent my entire afternoon there doing pages since I didn't feel like looking for a party. Near the end of my night, I saw a ranger that was asking if anyone would team up. I figured we'd do a couple of pages and then I'd go to sleep. As luck would have it, Keyoku showed up when we were on the last page. No rest for the weary and all that.

We did a couple of other pages and we were ready to call it quits. Just then, Aydgon (the rng) mentions that Kreutzet is up if any of us wanted the dagger. I'm not at the level to use it yet, but what the hell. I hear some people have horrid luck on the drop rates, so I might as well get started on it now. Being able to use a weapon and not having it is more annoying that getting it early. So the three of us rush out to see if it's claimed.

On the way to the spawn area, I spot two dead people by some Manticores. I felt bad, but none of us could raise and stopping to create a "{Raise}" shout would be inviting someone else to get the claim. We arrived and I noticed another person dead in the middle of the area. This led me to think that they were trying to solo or got caught off guard and died. Now I'm getting nervous. There are people around so I know other people are aware of the NM being available. Off in the distance, I spot three more people, but Kreutzet is just standing there unclaimed. My first thought was that other people had to be on the way and it was basically "now or never." So I threw my chakram and tagged it. Mind you, we had just finished a page and none of us were at full HP/MP. In hindsight, what I did was pretty stupid, and put us all at risk of a wipe. Live and learn I guess.

So there we stood; our BLU with less than 200 mp, RNG with roughly 40% HP and me with about 60% HP and 0 TP or finishing moves. To top it off, I was DNC/SAM, so no shadows and Seigan only works with two-handed weapons. Thankfully, Meditate was up and I used that to at least give myself a small heal. At first, I was going to tank while Key and Ayd did most of the damage. Apparently, Kruetzet had a different plan. No sooner than the fight started, he began with Stormwind spam. This was bad for us all, especially with everyone being so low on health and magic. I tried to keep everyone healed, but the near-constant spam of that move was just a little much to stay with. The next best thing was to have them get out of range and I'd just focus on healing myself while they actually rested.

This fight would have been so much easier if I had used Dancer's damage mitigation ability, but...yeah I don't have that unlocked yet. Shame on me I guess. Add on yet another disadvantage for this fight. Thankfully, I was able to keep up TP with Reverse Flourish and luckily landing all of my steps (thanks to Urd's gift). Key helped me out with a few cures when he could that also gave me an attack increase.

Just so happened that Ayd mentioned he had TH4 (!!) but didn't think he'd make it back in time. We took a chance and had him go switch midway through the fight. Things started getting interesting. I wasn't dodging as much, and I got pretty nervous. More stormwind spam, critical hits, and then that damn Triple Attack move dropped me to less than 100 HP at one point. It was sheer luck that I got a TP cure off and Key had just enough MP to heal me one last time. With the NM at 7%, Ayd zones back into the Cape. To prevent killing it before he arrived, I turned my back and tried to hold it off. Bad idea. Very bad. I'm guessing evasion doesn't work so well when you aren't facing the enemy. I wasn't going to make it that way, so I switched positions and went back to fighting. Checking the map, Ayd was basically one grid away from us now.

Kreutzet's at 2%, Key runs out of MP and I use the last bit of TP to heal as I turn away because it would only take a couple of hits to kill it. I get hit again and now have 117 HP. One strike and it's game over. Ayd appears and tags it with TH4. Key gets a head butt in and I turn to face the NM. It attacks and I get lucky with a parry. I quickly put up Third Eye in the hopes that we can drop this thing before it attacks me again. At that moment it uses Triple Attack and somehow, third eye anticipated it. That's a 3-hit attack...how the hell I avoided it is beyond me. Down goes the NM, and we're rewarded with a bit of exp, a bird feather, and 1/1 on the Sirocco Kukri!!

I'm sure things could have gone much smoother and simpler if we actually prepared, but the fact that we just ran in without a plan and still pulled it off made the fight really exciting and fun. Even without the dagger, I'm still incredibly proud of that fight.

These are the kinds of fights that I love being a part of. ^_^