Celestalia's Challenge - A Maple Journal

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PART CCLXIII. The Smore the Merrier

Spoiler: PART CCLXIII. The Smore the Merrier

So how long exactly was it going to take to land the final two cards? Well, this first one took half an hour after the start.


But the last card is always the most difficult, as they say...so the real question was, how long would Celestalia stay at four.

...Six minutes. The answer was six minutes.


Look, I don't make the RNG up. If I did, Celestalia would have had the Asianic Bow before Athena.

Anyway, now Celestalia could try out all of the doorways and see where she ended up. And almost every room of the house was accessible from here. She found a funny mirror (which did decent damage, actually), a toy room, a piano (oooooh), and even Sophilia herself!


But by far the two most interesting doors were to the library and to what appeared to be an inverted version of the same hallway!

Celestalia began in the library, since the enemy present in there was in the Orange tier.


They also drop a boatload of candy...including the elusive Green Gummy Slime which is the 600 HP version. She was missing that one.

The only thing that hits for a decent amount in here are the floating books, which are ~50 damage, but they are also invulnerable.

But wait, it turns out there's a fourth Gummy Slime! The red one restores 1200 points each!

In addition to all of this, they were also dropping...duct tape...?


And coat hangers...and chewed-up wads of gum. Oh and there were also a couple Jr. Wraiths thrown in to the mix too. And they drop Tablecloths...so Celestalia kind of could make an entire glider if she wanted.

But she would be satisfied with just cardboard.


The set overall didn't take a great deal of time, maybe like an hour or so.


More importantly, Celestalia found herself with over a stack and a half of Smores...equivalent to 77 Elixirs!

Sadly, the session had to be cut short due to some administrative issues that cropped up. It seems the uneasy peace that had been brokered with the Showa Mob may be in the process of breaking down. The Rangemaiden was on call with her general staff, as well as her local officials, for two straight hours trying to see whether the situation could be sorted out. They managed to come up with a temporary solution, which should last at least a couple weeks. That's ought to be enough time to clear out the remaining four card sets, if needed; though whether it will be enough time to clear out the Justice Cape is another matter entirely.

The base affairs in Masteria will go on to a fourth and likely final week, although it will be running contemporary to Suboptimal's entry into the "Mini Jame Gam" which Celestalia submitted herself to as a game design writer. I was debating cancelling next week, but the brunt of her work might be cleared up in time to start the session on time. At most, it will be on-and-off during the campaign hours, which should leave her plenty of time to at least do the remaining two sets within the mansion.

Celestalia is not planning on card hunting in the region any longer than next week, that's for sure.

See you on Friday, although who knows if it could be earlier than that. The timing on all of this is going to be a bit wacky.

 

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PART CCLXIV. Hoodoo You Do(n't)

Spoiler: CCLXIV. Hoodoo You Do(n't)

Now it was time to check out the inverted hallway. By the time Celestalia headed out, the period for submitting game ideas was almost over, and it seemed like her idea was going to prevail. But perhaps it wasn't as cut-and-dry as she was expecting.

In the meantime, some card sets needed to be put away.


Voodoo and Hoodoo are both Level 60 and as far as I can tell are the exact same apart from probably the drop tables.

Otherwise they are most well-known for this treat:


The Heartstopper gives 60 (!!!!) Weapon Attack for one minute. And a few other things.

And the first drop of note?


Oh. Yeah, that event is ending already isn't it.

Anyway. The first card came around 25 minutes in.


Hoodoo dropped a second card 15 minutes later. And, after an additional 15 minutes, a third card.

Voodoo meanwhile hadn't done anything except for fork over a few more of the spicy candies.

But they eventually reneged.


After a couple of equips, including an Esther Shield from Nightmare (that completed the drop table from them), Hoodoo dropped their fourth card. The drop table left a lot to be desired, sadly.

Voodoo, on the other hand...well, they had a surprise or two still tucked away...


Unbelievably the stats on the Blue Patriot are even worse. Only 2 DEX compared to the Beige's 3. It also didn't really fit Celestalia's style all that much.

Before any more curveballs from Voodoo were revealed, Hoodoo finished up their set. Less than 2 hours in to the session!


Judging from the Monster Book, there are a lot more areas of the Haunted House where Hoodoo (and maybe Voodoo?) could be found. Celestalia decided to take some time to look around and see if she could land a better hunting spot.

After trying a billion doors and going through an entirely different hallway, she came upon an upside-down study which was a flat room.


Or flat ceiling, if you will. Anyway, there are four separate spawn points in here that can be any one of four different mobs. But since there are only four, Celestalia can easily wipe out the room within the ten-second spawn window, and have all of them come back. A strategy that has been tried before, to decent results.

Of course the Sophilia Dolls have an odd habit of immediately flying up, or I suppose it should be down in this case, and out of reach of Strafe. Even with that though, she did get a card out of the ordeal. Then after leaving the room, there was apparently a Voodoo outside on the platform? It wasn't there when she went in. Honestly, who knows with this place; the ghosts go in and out of rooms and chambers all over the shop, such that applying the concept of "map conquest" is a bit more of a figurative thing than actually relying on card sets to acquire specific rooms of the house.

Also bear in mind: The hallway is all the same room; just being approached from other angles. There really is no way to fully enforce things.

With that philosophical argument flummoxing her, Celestalia returned to NLC to eat dinner.

Just to be on the safe side, Celestalia will stay in the main upside-down hallway for now. Which was also a good decision, because she got a card within a couple minutes. Unfortunately it took over an hour after that to nab the fourth card.

That said, could Voodoo have the drop table she was looking for???

...



Honestly don't even know why I tried. The mob it would make THE MOST SENSE TO HAVE THE DUMB CAPE naturally doesn't have it.

The Rangemaiden tried to grind some more, but was just too disgusted and left without finishing the set.

So that's it then. Unless Wolf Spider's got it tucked away, which as a Level 80 seems incredibly unlikely, the Justice Cape is locked behind the dark creepy depths of the Phantom Forest. And even if one of the lesser mobs has it, who really wants to spend all that time grinding in such an area like that...outside of Halloween season, anyway. I sure don't.

Therefore, it's time for Celestalia to settle that territorial dispute over in Zipangu...stay tuned.

 

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PART CCLXV. An Offer They Can't Refuse

Spoiler: PART CCLXV. An Offer They Can't Refuse

While the brunt of the military was attempting to secure control of Prendergast, negotiations between the Celestial Empire and the Showa Mob continued. Unfortunately, the diplomatic play broke down after the Mob attempted to force a deadline for Celestial forces to withdraw from Zipangu. That deadline was 18:00 server time today, and in preparation for that Celestalia had already arrived in Ludibrium and was ready to assume control of operations.

Things remained calm for the first few hours after the deadline, but around 20:00 a huge firefight erupted within the vicinity of Showa Street 3. After almost an hour of continuous combat, Celestial forces were able to carve a path all the way to Street 2. That was how Celestalia found things when she arrived.

With no enemies present on the top part of the map (where the portals are), she was able to skip that map entirely. Which is a great thing, since now she doesn't have to risk getting one-shot by Male Boss.


This map has literally all of the enemies Street 3 does, apart from Male Boss of course. So honestly, is there a difference? ...No. No there is not.

Anyway, as you can see Arrow Rain is the true don on this map. And cards promised to be steady, if not necessarily all that fast.


This is Extra A's second card, the first one being obtained in a very small skirmish back when the region was first unlocked.

By the way, don't be fooled too much. While Male Boss has a super-powerful pistol, and knows how to use it, Leader B's is more like a cap gun in comparison. Their shots never even break 150 against Celestalia. That doesn't change the fact though that there are so many attackers, and they hit quickly, meaning Celestalia more often than not has her health bar more white than red.

Strength in numbers indeed.

Extra C was the second of the five to yield cardboard.


The Rangemaiden was considering leaving to have dinner, but decided to go a little longer and ended up getting a second Extra C card. She finally did leave after attaining 50% XP.

Voodoos/Hoodoos are pretty good XP-wise. These fellows aren't that bad either.

As Celestalia returned to Mushroom Shrine, she went past one of her guildmates without even knowing. The guildmate was very plain-clothed but doing her best! They caught back up next to the Gachapon.


This is Guan Yunchang, an ancient warrior from nearly two millennia ago...or so she claims. Celestalia really struggled to get a good read on her as they shared a few brief words, but she did remember reading about her recent exploits (Journal here!). Although Celestalia much prefers to keep the details of her own digestive system a secret, she will never turn down an opportunity to get to know her buddies a little better.

Not that Celestalia's record along the lines of food has been all that perfect either. And you can imagine how many bits of Slime Gummies she has stuck in her teeth right about now...

During the final half-hour of the session, Celestalia got another card from both Extra A and Extra C, along with:


She also picked up a cool dagger, but none of her three 10%s worked on it. And it was a gray name anyway. Oh well.

Not a lot of time was actually able to be spent today, but six cards is not a bad haul! Plus, Celestalia did end up picking up a few of those Fury Arrows (Attack +4). They're not as good as Diamond Arrows, but it sure can't hurt to have them around.

The action will pick up next Friday as the battle with the Mob continues. Take care!

 

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PART CCLXVI. Top o' the Ohayou!

Spoiler: PART CCLXVI. Top o' the Ohayou!

It's St. Patrick's Day, which doesn't necessarily mean much to Celestalia or the campaign, but I like the sound of Irish music a lot. And there are more than a few similarities between the verdant meadows of the Emerald Isle and the prairies surrounding the Vereina estate in Henesys.

In any case, after a week of R&R, it was time to resume the fight against Showa. So far, it's been a strange one. Celestalia has three cards from two minions, none from the third, and one leader card.

Naturally, the same leader opened things up today.


So the tally now stood at 3-0-3-0-2. This was teeing up to be a complete disaster.

Sure enough, the next card to fall was the fourth Extra A.


Then Leader B dropped another one! NOW it was 4-0-3-0-3. Typical of Leader A, who does by far the most damage, to also be such a troll. I was pretty sure Aescavon at least got a card from Extra B...not sure where they're at.

Oh, also. Maple is apparently considering plastic bottles to be weapons now. Janitorial supplies was bad enough, but this??

Ramuné bottles I could see though.

The dagger Celestalia picked up last time, incidentally, is the double-bladed one next to it (Liu Bei).

And FINALLY Extra B decided to join in on the action.

The drop table isn't bricked after all!

Some time later, it was Extra C's turn. His drop table has exactly two items, the Etc. drop, and a Dark Snowboard. Absolutely pathetic.

Completing the circle, Extra A finished up after that.


But that doesn't mean they just up and surrender, no. The mob is most certainly a "package deal", i.e., all five have to be taken down before victory can officially be claimed. Considering Leader A is STILL without any cards, that is going to be a difficult task indeed.

The seventh card of the session was yielded by Extra B, putting the tally at 5-2-4-0-3. At that point, the Rangemaiden decided to grab a break, and didn't return to the front until after dinner. Still, it was a fantastic start.

After a pretty decent amount of fried fish, Celestalia returned and immediately snagged one more from both Extra B and Extra C. Which topped off the latter set.


At that point she was pretty satisfied, and went back to Ludibrium to enjoy the rest of the holiday.

The tally is 5-3-5-0-3. While there are only 9 cards left now, there's no way the entirety of Leader A will fall in just one Saturday...right?

 

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PART CCLXVII. Ordem e Progresso

Spoiler: PART CCLXVII. Ordem e Progresso

Celestalia spent another thirty minutes fighting the mob before she realized that it was probably a tremendous waste of time. It didn't help that the two cards she received were both from Extra C. So now that she's seen how bad the drop tables are, rather than drain all of her restorative items into that fruitless endeavor, she decided to go back to fighting things that would actually drop stuff.

And of a surety she did not want to go back to Masteria, for obvious reasons. So, while she had the energy, why not try again at:


No one guaranteed that anyone would get anything.

But to their credit, the first drop that came was a brand new one!


Of course it wasn't the Red Hinkel.

They then dropped a Deadly Fin, followed by the third example of this:


Still as useless as ever. But the equips are coming out!

And then another weapon.


Lazy Buffy pinched in with a Black Gaia Cape and a Sapphire Clench, both of these were also first-time drops.

At last Buffy dropped something that wasn't threatening-looking.


But then they just went back to Skull Earrings.

Then, Lazy Buffy gave up another Choro, so that's eight total Bowman overalls lifetime from them.

Next up:


And:


The Viska is overall #16...overall. Yeah. What is anyone meant to do with 16 overalls?

Buffy immediately gifted the Rangemaiden a second one.

And then, well Celestalia already has one of these, but...


Yeah I'm pretty sure hers is max Jump. So this just gets sold.

Ah, by the way, the gold thing sticking out behind the money bundle is a Year of the Rabbit Coin. Celestalia will have to see if she can exchange for something eventually.

Around the time the Colorful Tube dropped, a Priest belonging to the world-famous SURRA guild offered to party.


LordZEH was in the map to hunt cards. A service which Celestalia very much could help with! Provided he was on the lookout for the Red Hinkel, of course.

Shortly after they began grinding, however, he had to depart for a much more noble pursuit: dinner. Celestalia's was coming up shortly too; how many more equips would she land before then?

The first drop after the tube was another Brown Lorin, followed by an Oaker Shouldermail. That's fifteen equips in less than four hours!

They weren't done there; Lazy Buffy provided another TWO Blue Linnex (#5/6!!), an Umber Shouldermail Pants, and kicked with an Old Mithril Nordic Helm.

LordZEH came back eventually, and something very quickly happened...


He pulled it off?!!?!?!

SURRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, I knew the entire time the Hinkel was going to be less Attack than the BMD. That was basically a given. But who cares!


After all, there are many other ways to get damage.


So how many cards did Celestalia end up getting for this glorious character? Believe it or not, 3. With that, he was able to complete the Buffy set in a very short time. Unfortunately, dinner was approaching and she couldn't help with Lazy Buffy. And the gentleman repeatedly refused the 350k that Celestalia owed him per the rules. I don't know what I am meant to do about that, the rules apparently assumed that the person would accept the bonus. But 350k also isn't a great deal of money at this stage. Celestalia will find something to do with it that is just as charitable.

[Editor's Note: She did eventually get to give something back to the Federative Republic. Strangely enough, it involved an equip mentioned in this post!]

Anyway, here's the final tally from both mobs.


Hopefully Soul Teddy doesn't fill up the equip inventory as quickly...I can't believe I just said that.

 

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PART CCLXVIII. The Shoes Athena Fancies

Spoiler: PART CCLXVIII. The Shoes Athena Fancies

It's considered a carefully guarded secret in the archery world, mostly because the lore has next to no information on it, but how old is Athena Pierce really? Celestalia always thought she was Athena's biggest fan, but there exists at least one with greater affinity - and his best guess is 600. In the same copypasta, he mentions that Athena is an Elf. Celestalia never really saw any difference. Either way, there's a whole tier of Bowman shoes named after that race, and she can kind of picture Athena wearing them.

Time to acquire a pair, but first, there was much seafood to be had. Although she was waiting a fairly long time for the supply train to actually make it down to the Path of Time. This usually isn't a problem, although in this case where Celestalia was laid over in Victoria for two weeks, it can be understandable that some of the logistics are slow to get going again, and then make it across two boat rides, and then make it halfway down the Clocktower.

On to the fighting.


This first Teddy dropped the Violet Platina Pants.


Next:


Followed by a second Thief equip:


Oh, and I completely forgot that Soul Teddy drops Glove ATT 60%...

So at long last, the Willow can come off.


There was a chance at another lateral move (I call this lateral because Celestalia lost 9 MP in the exchange),


But the Patriots still can't get decent stats going.

The hat was followed by a second Brown Moon Pants.

Now, it was Master Soul Teddy's turn, with the Brown Husk.


Which was the only equip they managed to drop at all, because about 30 minutes later...


Splendid work! The stats are pretty mediocre, +2 Weapon Defense and -1 DEX, but Celestalia can't go wrong at this point by investing in defensive capabilities. At the same time, none of the remaining three equips (Blue Falcon from Homunculus, Blue Cordon from Captain, and Green Wing Boots from Tauromacis) were really calling out to be obtained.

So while the Rangemaiden was in the neighborhood, why not pay another visit to:

Thoughts on the boots?

I want to reiterate how unplayable this map would be without Arrow Bomb. I reckon I'm going to be saying that quite a bit for the remainder of the campaign.

You know what though, at the end of the day, there's a system that works, and that's all that's going to count.


Very soon Klock had dropped two more for a total of 4! Insane efficiency, but is the drop table worth it?


Heck yeah, the next Earrings! I don't know why they're called "Half", they look full to me. The Single Earring is half a set though. I'm not terribly impressed with the Blue Wing Boots, but if they get a good DEX roll Celestalia will absolutely take them.

Well, you're not going to believe what happened next.

That's right, they dropped ANOTHER CARD.


The last four cards took, collectively, 35 minutes, and that with significant breaks in the action. And AS A WHOLE, Celestalia earned...NOT EVEN 8% EXPERIENCE. She did spend a bit more time in combat, but it was pretty obvious that Dark Klock didn't want to play anything near the kind of ball Klock was. So, still shy of 9%, she left. I've got to say, that is the most productive <9% of experience I've ever had in this game! At least it feels like it.

Tune in tomorrow to see what Dark Klock might have in store, should it ever start providing some cardboard of course.

 

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PART CCLXIX. The Long, Long Tomorrow

Spoiler: PART CCLXIX. The Long, Long Tomorrow

Welcome back to a campaign which is at this point ancient history! Obviously, there is a lot of explaining I have to do, I'll try to keep it somewhat brief.

When we last left off, Celestalia had just cleared the Klock card set, and (if I remember correctly) was marching forward against Dark Klock when she realized she was taking too much damage and was getting no action from them in return. So, she decided to pause for a while to catch her breath. And by that, I mean she went back to the Nautilus and let her administrators run the Empire while she got fat off of snacks and other regal living...at least by her standards.

Eventually, her "imaginary" mesos ran out and after it was discovered she couldn't pay most of her entourage, they all left. The Auburns went completely inactive too, so really the only one she had any contact with regularly was Erenell. Athena, too, was less than pleased at her lack of resolve, to put it lightly. Celestalia paid her a visit late last year, and...it didn't go too well.

Part of the issue was, perhaps, that Celestalia had a hankering to go visit other worlds - something she saw characters like Eleftheria and the Metal Lord, for instance, do all the time. More specifically, she really wanted to explore Eleftheria's home world, which she heard was full of history, intrigue, and many different peoples and cultures. But she was denied on numerous occasions.

By December, Celestalia felt destitute and alone - even worse than she felt before she left her estate over four years earlier. A solution had to be found.

More accurately, a solution found her. As it turned out, the multiverse was hiding one last member of the Auburn family. I cannot name her, but let's just say she is something of the actual leader of the family. To put it simply - Celestalia now calls another dimension home. One a bit more celestial than she so far has known! She can still live the (very) high life, but at the same time she's also more than capable of running things in this world. Case in point, take a look at what she's been up to in the past week and a half!

The holy Plonk has returned!!

Celestalia finally got to fulfill another dream of hers - being a perma beginner. And all while being subjected to an even more extreme challenge than this one. As of this post, she just hit Level 30...and somehow already has 3 Fame, despite only having access to the Lith-Henesys corridor. I really don't know how she does it. Oh, and she finally got to do something that previously she never could - Gachapon! Would you believe me if I tell you her very first session gave her an Overall INT 30%? Assuming that's still the meta...it has been two years. Eh.

You may also have noticed that she has yet another new hairstyle. For those of you who aren't familiar with the journal, Celestalia has gone through about five hairstyles as she's advanced in level (and/or job). She will probably keep this one for the remainder of the campaign.

Oh, yes. The campaign. So just as a reminder, here are the two high-level rules. Basically, Celestalia needs to clear the card set for each mob in a map that she would run into on the way from portal to portal. And she has to get all of her equips in level order before she can wear them (e.g. no skipping from the Hinkel to the Nisrock). Those are the major restrictions. I did also say there would be some changes on this side of the break, however I actually don't think there's too many. There is, however, one major implication from her time off.

That unknown Auburn I mentioned earlier also has the power to induct new members of the family. That's right, Celestalia is now officially an Auburn! Which technically means, and I did not realize this until recently, that she can use her own Gachapon tickets for the first time. The initial agreement she worked with on starting this campaign was that all tickets would become the property of the family. She's family now. So that worked out really well

With this, I need to introduce two additional rules:

1. Items obtained from Gachapon do not count towards the equip progression table. Celestalia must still acquire an equip from a monster before she can count it as obtained. However, she is permitted to upgrade items through Gachapon that she has already obtained, and she may also hold on to future items if the inventory space is available.

2. Celestalia is now allowed to sell items on the Free Market only. She still cannot purchase items from other players.

The main reason she is being permitted to open a storefront in the FM is really because I can't be bothered to clear out storage on my other characters

ANYWAY, let's get started!


In true Celestalia fashion, she killed three guys and then went back up to the safe platform to teleport out and eat dinner. She may be technically immortal now, but that doesn't stop her from enjoying her inalienable right to three meals a day. And as far as she's concerned, a chair made out of clouds is a lot better than the Relaxer. Don't worry, there will still be plenty of opportunities to heal in this world! Incidentally, she is now capable of, should she choose, teleporting in her food too, which is really great as it means she doesn't need to worry about supplies. (Note for newcomers that all of Celestalia's food/snack options are completely imaginary and don't affect gameplay in the slightest )

The session began in earnest around 00:30 server time. About half an hour later, the first equip drop is upon her.


Not entirely new, but not sure what she was expecting.

The goal of this session was really to get her feet wet again and make sure she was capable of getting the patterns down again. Honestly, it didn't take very long to do that, but she was being very liberal with Arrow Bomb just to keep herself healthy. That meant Elixir usage (she started the session with over 1,000 of these, but few other pots) was moderate, but sustainable, especially as both Klocks were dropping them at a well enough rate. She made sure to make good use of the Blue Potion Chair too, just to keep things in check. (And for the same reason as Gachapon, if she didn't have the BPC yet at this point, now is when she would have gotten access to it.)

A little under an hour after the last drop, Celestalia finds:


It's an Abyss Shooter. This is the second one, her first one was at Teddies one floor above. Dark Klock dropped this one. It'd be nice to see some other things it drops, but Celestalia is roughly three cards away from that with an estimated time of about a gagillion hours. It's okay though, she has the time.

Next drop was an Umber Mantis, which fell behind one of those piles of blue goop and so no screenshot

Dark Klock had another goodie, a Red Infinium Circlet.


I mean I'd still prefer cards, but I guess you can just drop the whole table too. That sort of works.

Klock decided to...clock...in again with a Bronze Gigantic.


Barely a minute later they followed up with a Blue Requierre.


Time for the hat trick!


SHE'S SO BACK.

Welp, that's probably as good a place to stop as any! It really doesn't look like there are gonna be any cards coming out of here soon, even though it seemed like Celestalia was doing pretty well moving around the map. Alas, it may pay to try out some other areas for the meantime. She'll come back after she gets a little stronger. I might have an ace up my sleeve there. Keyword is might.

Next time on Celestalia's Challenge, a little bit of surveying to see what her options are. Stay tuned!

 

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PART CCLXX. Re-surveying the Empire

Spoiler: PART CCLXX. Re-surveying the Empire

There are presently, as far as Celestalia knows, five areas where she can make "progress" - that is, obtaining new card sets. Part of the problem is that many of said card sets are really tough, either in terms of potion use, or mob throughput, or bad RNG. While her ability to go to the most efficient map for a mob somewhat counteracts that last one, the others she can't do much about aside from just training a bunch.

Here's what she's up against right now:

• Ossyria - Lucida is the last card set remaining in Orbis, aside from Jr. Lucida but she's not necessarily keen to mess with Eliza yet. This is doable, but she needs to be very careful that she doesn't run into the big cat. The other mob, in El Nath, is Yeti and Pepe which hits hard, and so she's also not particularly keen to tangle with that either.
• Ludibrium - Dark Klock, and on the other side of the aisle, the upgraded Jesters which she actually hasn't met yet. She's assuming they're about the same strength as the Klocks and will leave that map alone for now.
• Deep Aqua Road - Looking in the Monster Book, from what she can see the only aquatic monsters she can find are in the Purple tier and above (>Level 90). So she definitely isn't coming here yet. Things down this way can probably kill her in two hits.
• Masteria - Celestalia has two options here, either very slowly farm Wolf Spider by Arrow Raining them through the walls, or make her way through the Phantom Forest and try not to get killed by either Bigfoot or Headless Horseman. She is pretty sure she can get the card sets for the weaker mobs without needing to worry about the flat maps, but that likely won't get her any closer to the Justice Cape. [Spoiler Alert: Technically it will, but not meaningfully so.]
• Zipangu - The mafia is always available to farm cards from. It will be a good place for a diversion if she can't be bothered to fight elsewhere. There is, however, another location which she wasn't able to find her first go-around. What she didn't realize at the time was that multiple card sets she already has could have pointed her in that direction.

So, she'll head there now.


The cemetery in Zipangu is quite foreboding, but this first map has not too much going on, just Crow, Zombie Mushroom, and Dark Stone Golem for whatever reason. None of these are too threatening for the Rangemaiden.

She moves one map further and finds some Jr. Wraith-looking things wearing weird headbands.


There are also Big Cloud Foxes here, but they're not as bad. As for these 'Nightghosts', two Strafes is more than enough to take them down. Also, since they're flying, Celestalia can also use Arrow Rain here to decent effect.

Nightghost sometimes drops bottles of Grape Juice, equal to three Mana Elixirs each. Yum! Has anyone else tried Sparkling grape juice? I get a bottle every New Year's - a very old tradition for me.

After over an hour of fighting, and probably something like 500 Nightghosts in, Celestalia got her first card.


The other thing Celestalia has been working on in her beginner quest is trying to catalogue her drops to get a ballpark drop rate for some things - mostly cards. What she's found in the meantime has been interesting, though. Most all the monsters she's looked at so far have an Etc. drop rate somewhere around 60%. That means she can get a rough number of how many things she's killed, assuming she picks up all her drops, by dividing the number of their Etc. by 3, then multiplying by 5.

I don't know how much I'm going to use that measure, but it might be interesting to monitor.

Card #2 dropped 15-20 minutes after that one, right on the bridge on the highest platform, the giant moon shooting beams down onto it. After that, Celestalia made her way to 30% and returned to Mushroom Shrine, just shy of two hours into the session, to go up and eat dinner. I will say the XP here is somewhat faster than at Klock, which makes sense because two Strafes < five Strafes, but not sure that's going to make much difference either. Maybe at some point Celestalia will have to figure out where her best rate is.

She returned to action at 23:30 server time, and had the third and fourth cards within half an hour. A lot of people probably know that Nightghost drops a lot of 30% scrolls, and so are a somewhat-popular hunting spot. Celestalia's most useful thing here is probably Cape DEX 30%, but grinding for a lot of them when she's constantly getting pushed around and having to pop Elixirs isn't great.

Not too long after the fourth card, she did in fact get a scroll:


Overall INT 70%. Another one which I'm not sure how much it goes for these days, but should be decent, right? I think?

Anyway, that concluded this engagement.


The Rangemaiden advances to the next map to find...


Zombies. Yeah, that makes sense.

Great news abounds in that she was able to kill the first one in one Strafe. Unfortunately, there were more of the stupid ghost thingies flying around. Though they didn't seem to be as annoying as in the first map.

Coolie Zombies drop teeth, although it kind of looks like they don't have any teeth whatsoever. Also, what they lack in HP they more than make up for with a deadly spitting attack which can apply poison, which drains 15 HP every few ticks. Celestalia should be careful to make sure this condition doesn't end up secretly taking her out.

[Editor's Note: It didn't.]

Celestalia got on the board again very rapidly.


After roughly an hour or so, she was up to 3 cards. But by that time her Etc. inventory was full and she had to pull back to Ludibrium to sell. She briefly considered heading back to Vic to roll her fairly large number of tickets on Gachapon, but since she only had two cards left she might as well stay.

According to the Monster Book, these guys are natives to...El Nath?! Well, she's certainly never seen any zombies around there. Nor did she have any clue how they wouldn't freeze and break down in the winter.

When she was going through her inventory at the Grocer's she noticed she obtained a set of Tobi Throwing Stars...the recharge for them was 10k?! She had to do a double take...she had no clue they had gotten so expensive! Well I don't know how she missed it, they changed that way back in August of 2022...she was active at the time.

Anyway. The fourth card dropped round about quarter to 2, and it was another half hour or so for the last one.


Yeah, not bad! It's nice to have consistent cards for a change. Now, here's the kicker. On the regional map, Celestalia saw one final area on this path...it's called "WanWan Spa of Hell". Now, while she hasn't been adventuring a lot in the last two years, she HAS certainly been studying her some Zipangese. She realized that 'Wan' is the sound a dog makes. So, evidently, this last area has some type of canine...hellhounds, probably. Those are quite dangerous. And she believed they were probably through this sign:


After giving all of the above some thought, she ultimately decided to leave them alone and go roll her Gachapon.

The next installment will cover the RNG mania. See you then!

That warms my heart greatly, thank you for your continued support

 

​

PART CCLXXI. Let's Gachapon!

Spoiler: PART CCLXXI. Let's Gachapon!

It was a warm and crisp Monday evening. The moment was here, finally. Four and a half years she had waited to roll the great RNG machine, and with 41 tickets to use (28 Common, 13 Rare), there was so much potential to be had.

Celestalia had already opened (and closed) her first store in the Free Market at the time she made this run. It was unbelievable - she pocketed well over 10 million mesos from that one store alone! And this would promise quite a bit more. It's a really good thing the Auburn family had so much NX saved - Owls of Minerva are cheap, but not that cheap!

So what did Celestalia end up getting? Honestly, not much. There were a few good scrolls, like Cape INT 70%, that wasn't bad. A few six-figure equips too. But there was one big prize...here it is:


Yep, the BMD got another Bow ATT 60% to stick. And the Rangemaiden had an additional chance with a Bow ATT 10%, of course that did not work. Nice try though! Either way, the BMD is now guaranteed to be equal or better to any Hinkel she finds, so naturally she'll stick with this until she can get her hands on an Arund. With that said, apparently the Golden Hinkel adds speed...that could be useful towards that "ace up the sleeve" I mentioned last part.

Unfortunately, after finishing the run and going to set up her second store, Celestalia somehow got booted back to her home dimension and couldn't reestablish a connection to the Maple World until today. Hence why everything up to this point is in past tense.

Eventually she did finally get her second store open and left the FM, at which point someone passing by randomly gifted her a Fame while she wasn't looking.


Anyway, she then left Henesys to sell her remaining Gachapon equips. Her first stop was Kerning City, and right upon getting out of the taxi door she was ambushed by a feminine figure wielding a massive sword.


She was chased off after a few Strafes, only for Celestalia to witness another very interesting character wandering the streets:

I didn't see any tombstones around though...

Celestalia quickly noticed the lack of reaction to this fellow and realized he was not doing any harm. She also didn't hear any Prussian military marches, so that was another good sign. But it did give her an idea. As it turns out, Jr. Balrog's main minions have an item Celestalia could go for. Incidentally, such an equip would be, if this post is to be believed, the very last requirement Celestalia needs to enter Leafre. That could indeed be the key to greatness. Keyword is could.

Well thing is, she has six levels and 2 Weapon Attack up on the initial assault. So while still scary...


The Green Wing Boots will be more than worth it. Also, there are plenty of healing spots to be had on this map.

Strategy is pretty simple, stay on the elevated left side and let the Tauros come to her. She can work on up to four at a time this way if they spawn correctly. Arrow Bomb, of course, is king.

However, there was an immediate problem: Taurospear quickly caught on to her scheme and began piling up on both sides of her. She got overwhelmed fairly quickly and only a timely Miss from a lightning swipe allowed her to retreat safely.

In a rush of fury, she return scrolled to Sleepywood and tailed it all the way back to Perion. It seemed like she was going to go to Commander Skeleton after all, but after calming down, she realized she could probably still just grind at Entrance II where there are no Taurospears and be fine.

But it's good that she went to Perion, because look who showed up!

Persistência é a chave!

So the man did get his Fame after all. And it was his first one

Anyway, back to Sanctuary. So the Rangemaiden was having a heck of a time fighting through hordes upon hordes of Cold Eyes and trying to balance Tauromacis spawns. She was doing pretty well, although spawn rate certainly could have been better. For some reason, the Cold Eyes kept dropping a certain scroll...Helmet DEF 60%. She eventually wound up with six of them, which conveniently was exactly how many slots her Beige Patriot had open. She figured why not, and slapped them on...and got 3/6. Okay, not bad. So now the Patriot has 48 WDef and 3 extra points of MDef...can never have too much of both.

Since she was tired of slapping Cold Eyes around, she thought she would go to Perion again and actually try this time at the Cliff.


This picture doesn't do it justice, but there are a ton of these guys on this map. Upwards of four to a platform, even more at the long one at the top.

The first drop Celestalia gets is a Rare Gachapon Ticket, which is certainly not insignificant now, followed by...I guess a current friend?


Very little change on this piece. It's +1 DEX and -2 MP, so honestly a wash. Celestalia put it on though because her current one lost two scroll spots to Gachapon

Ah, a small gift to accompany the new overall?


Well actually not really, it's a LUK 60%. But Celestalia is in fact in luck, because it just so happened that her store was selling one, AND it already sold! So she just put this one up for the same price. (Note that was after scrolling back to Perion XD)

Before heading back home for the night though, she stopped over at Henesys to turn in that ticket...a Glove DEX 10%. And true to form, it failed. Look, she's had one work at some point in this campaign. I think. Actually...

Anyway, Celestalia was pretty satisfied with the mob throughput, so figured she could just spend all next session hunting for the Wing Boots. And if she gets a bad roll on them, no problem because the +1 DEX from the new Lineros makes up for it.

In the next session, the Battle of the Cliff resumes. Stay tuned!

 

​

PART CCLXXII. The Scroll(s) of Truth

Spoiler: PART CCLXXII. The Scroll(s) of Truth

I wasn't planning to have a full session today but 1. I got roughly everything else I wanted to get done today done and 2. The session was pretty game-changing. Allow me to unveil the events du jour.

Celestalia started out exactly as she planned, going to Commander Skeleton. She used the entire map this time, and generally did well. The equip on offer today was a Steel Aquila Shield (Level 80).


Officer Skeleton decided it didn't want to be outdone though and had a very, very interesting drop. Glove ATT 60%.

As you might have expected from the title, this scroll went through.


Yeah, this is a pretty insane glove now. At least by Celestalia standards. Here's the better part - she can easily get more. Because once again she got an idea.

I could get more scrolls from these guys in the interior maps, she thought, But surely there's an easier mob to get them from...

Scouring the Monster Book, she realized she was right. Platoon Chronos drops the same scroll, AND it has a map all its own. Maybe she overlooked it at the time she got their card set...granted, she was switching out gloves at a fair pace at the time. By the way, neither Cordon (the next glove) really beats this one stats-wise aside from Weapon Defense. THAT said, there's nothing wrong with grinding for scrolls every once in a while. I've avoided it up to now because frankly there have been many better things to do. However, done right, they could greatly improve Celestalia's game.

There was another scroll she was pretty curious about...naturally, that would be Bow ATT 60%. As it turns out, there's quite a few targets she can go for. But she had to think about mob throughput too...and with that in mind, she found what she thinks to be a decent place:


It's another map with only one mob, and Arrow Rain - even regular arrow - pretty regularly kills these guys in one hit, as the above photo demonstrates. And the best part of this one is she can keep count of how many she's killed by tracking her experience.

So how long did it take her to get her first scroll? How about 1,246 Jr. Lioners. That's it. Less than an hour, I think, to get there. And once again -


It stuck.

Combined, the two scrolls boosted her minimum attack range by something on the order of 30-35 points.

The crazy thing is, there are still three slots open. Imagine the Rangemaiden with a 93 WA bow. That very likely won't happen. It's fun to dream though. Precisely what this campaign is all about.

However, in tomorrow's entry, another adventurer has her dream realized. To whom belongs this honor? Stay tuned to find out!

 

​

PART CCLXXIII. Princess of the Permas

Spoiler: PART CCLXXIII. Princess of the Permas

It was too good to be true. She had only gotten through about another 200 Jr. Lioners, and couldn't believe her luck. Alas, it ran out.

After that disappointment, Celestalia worked her way up to 2,500 total, and returned to Victoria Island, even though it was pretty early in the day still.

The reason? Well, a very important event was about to head down, on a map which was otherwise not very newsworthy: Thicket Around the Beach II.

It's mostly Slimes and Snails, with a couple of each type of Pig at the top. Celestalia completely ignored this map in her first campaign...not so much for her Cardcaptor career though. Indeed, she spent multiple days slogging her way through the Pig card sets, as much she had to. This map is, for that reason, where she started cataloging some of the drop rates.

Of course, she did make it out of there. Even if at one point she thought she wouldn't.

Now, she is back in her Rangemaiden form...ready to celebrate a very grand achievement. Furbs, the perma beginner, is about to hit Level 120, all without leeching. And she decided to hold it, for whatever reason, in the map which so recently Celestalia has gotten quite familiar with.

She got to the map, after selling her equips and such, a bit after 11:30 server time, half an hour before the party start time. She was the third one there.

"welcome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

After doing the slightest bit of small talk, the woman of the hour emerged.

An absolutely gorgeous chair. It's a unique, of course.

And following her, a massive throng of supporters, and some celebrities!

That is Bertolt at the upper left, ib3so4py at the top right, and Itzybitzy on the right center platform behind Natte.

After a little bit more waiting on people, Furbs began into a riveting story about her entire journey, or more accurately that of her entire family. As far as she herself went, almost every party quest in the game was mentioned - beginners should never go through this world alone, after all. And some card hunting, of course. But overall, it was a story of determination, down to the very end.

The story took nearly an hour to recount.

For Celestalia to witness such a remarkable accomplishment first-hand, it was worth the wait.


And Furbs, somehow, wasn't the only one:


Two 120s at once. A feat that will likely never be repeated. Perhaps it really is the Year of the Beginner, as people are saying.

(Disclaimer: It was mentioned that Weakling was leeched at least part of the way there.)

The Rangemaiden was motivated more than she had been in a long time. And so, in a very bold move, (and realizing that she had forgotten someone that dropped Wing Boots,) she took up the arrow once again against an old foe:


And she brought a friend with her, apparently!


She introduced this gentleman to the challenge after getting off the ship to Orbis (there was a Hunter there too, with whom she traded Fame). He was more than willing to help in the hunt for the-


...That. Yeah.

Oh and, IT'S +3 DEX!! That means she doesn't lose stats!!

And that's not all, because...


Barely five minutes after this card, the Rangemaiden got a second Blue Wing Boots. Much worse, but isn't that hilarious how RNG toys with her?

By the way, Lunatico finished the entire Klock set in record time. Celestalia knew of course they were generous with their cards, but it really showed after he demonstrated the ability to fly through the map by poisoning everything down to 1 HP...and more impressively, doing so without short-circuiting her camera, like that other time...

Anyway, with the help of the incredible Mage, Dark Klock had no choice but to drop card after card. And keep in mind, they were hunting for two sets - Lunatico was starting from scratch here. By about 03:30 server time, Celestalia finally got access to Dark Klock's drop table...and she was quite pleased with what she found.


That is a really nice upgrade. Potentially, anyway.

The two continued slicing and dicing their way through the map for another half an hour, at which point the Mage finally ran out of pots and had to retreat.

Celestalia of course had many more Elixirs to go around, but she was getting quite tired having essentially been in the world for six hours straight, and so she also retreated.

Both characters wound up gaining three Dark Klock cards, and a nice chunk of XP. And, well, Lunatico has a good head-start on filling out his book. Though, he might be a few million mesos down from the pot expenditures. Who knows. Money well spent?

So, Leafre is now unofficially open. Still, Celestalia is not that far off from a level, and the Green Falcon is available. Plus, does she really want to leave this card set incomplete after having put in so much work today? Not in the slightest.

Then, only one question remains...where in the world am I going to take the next banner picture...

 

​

PART CCLXXIV. The Klock Strikes Midnight

Spoiler: PART CCLXXIV. The Klock Strikes Midnight

I thought I had done a photo on this map but it turns out I had to redo it because I didn't copy enough pixels off of it to fit the banner width. So this design was actually supposed to be the last one.

Ludibrium is pretty exhausted of potential designs now, so hopefully there won't be many more equips coming out of here. That said, that's sort of why Celestalia is at Klocks again today.

The fighting began very early, about 15:30 server time, although she did stop to eat lunch before a full pass through the map.

First equip came quickly as well, courtesy of Klock.


Which turned out to be the only one, because Dark Klock decided to capitulate.



The long struggle which caused Celestalia's two-year absence is at a close! She decided to celebrate the only way she knew how. Of course, by heading to the next opponent!


These jolly fellows behave almost essentially identical to the Klocks. They attack by slamming down their timekeeping devices, which comes out a lot faster, but is somewhat weaker.


Also the map seems to have a lot less long platforms. That's not necessarily bad, generally that means there are more sniping locations. It also means Celestalia moves down the map a lot faster.

Deep Buffoon was the first to yield a card, only took about 2-3 passes.


Then they gave her...


A DEX-based Patriot...it's about time! But seriously, do you honestly think Celestalia is going to change her signature hat after all this time just for one extra point? And she would lose 5 Weapon Defense with this one.

She decided she would wait to see if they would offer one with slightly better defense.

Meanwhile, Buffoon got on the board.


This is the Infinity's Wrath, Level 80 Gun. A new record for that line. Celestalia is really hoping for an Arund though.

They also got on the board in the other way.


Then, a Blue Studded Pants, Level 70 for Thief:


I don't know about you, but I'm not sure I'd want to take on the Dark Lord wearing baggy pants.

They then yielded their second card. And then a third! Right as Celestalia was picking up momentum, both Buffoons knew they had to put a stop to the madness. They started digging into their bags of trickery - spawning on top of the Rangemaiden, trying not to be stunned by Arrow Bomb, and letting Celestalia confuse herself about which way she was supposed to go down the map.

However, it was not enough, and soon Celestalia had the fourth Buffoon card.

The drop table looks like this:


Which is far from the worst she's come across recently. Especially that Dark Lineros - very spicy. Maybe she will put on that Dark Patriot after all.

Shortly after that, a Priest came into the map looking for...a Hidden Street?? Celestalia had no idea there were hidden maps in Deep Ludi.


Since the map had 'Time' in the name, Celestalia imagined it was somewhere around here, but didn't know which side it was on - or which map. But she had a hunch (by 'hunch' mean I looked it up in the Library really quick ) that it was on this side - Warped, Unbalanced. Yeah, makes sense.

She soon was on her way and Celestalia returned to the fight. And would you believe what dropped next!!!


So that's what, three equipment upgrades in six entries? Not that I can really call the Red Cordon an upgrade until Celestalia gets some scrolling done on it.

It took a substantial effort, but Buffoon eventually went down.


So now she's exactly where she was with Klock. I don't know if that's a good sign or not...probably not. But no worries, time to do some scroll hunting.

On the way up the Clocktower, Celestalia ran into a Paladin looking for someone to help hunt the infamous Papulatus, the grand overseer of the machine. Although she was not nearly powerful enough to offer her services (and didn't have access to down there anyway), he still gave her a Fame. That's another thing she's collecting in spades these days.

Weapon Attack has kind of been one more. Hopefully that continues.


But first, one additional order of business:


The extra level doesn't come with a huge amount of bonuses yet, but Celestalia now has the skill points...theoretically...to do something really neat. Something which could open a considerable amount of doors for her moving forward.

In the next installment of Celestalia's Challenge, see if the Red Cordon becomes a worthy successor to the Gold Eyes...and see where Celestalia decides to head next! Stay tuned.

 

​

PART CCLXXV. The Minar Maiden

Spoiler: PART CCLXXV. The Minar Maiden

So there's the end result, at least for now. You will notice that both 60%s Celestalia got worked, so huge huge bonus there. To be fair, Platoon Chronos isn't all that much stronger than Jr. Lioner, so she still rips through them. It took, I think, about 3,000 to get these two, but since there was a level in the interim the calculations weren't cut and dry.

Anyway! With the weapon attack situation squared away, it is finally time for a new region.


A quaint and mystical village sequestered away in the depths of the Minar Forest, Leafre is inhabited by a strange people known as the 'Hafrings', who are very in tune with their natural surroundings and largely survive through a symbiotic relationship with the dragons. There are some human residents as well, though not many.

Of course there are more than just Hafrings and dragons in this region, as the Rangemaiden quickly found out.


Yeah, does anyone else think her current Strafe just isn't cutting it? That's what I thought. So, Celestalia took the decision to reset 12 points and get Strafe to max.

Thrust -2, Mortal Blow -5, Arrow Rain -5. Picture has been edited to show all skills.

That was the aforementioned 'ace in the sleeve'. She now deals 110% per arrow at a cost of 32 MP per cast.

Celestalia saw the difference immediately. Beetle was now falling in three Strafes pretty universally, sometimes two and an extra arrow. Although, it didn't help their case that they kept doing some weird ritual with shaking their hands before advancing on her.


It actually slows her to 80% speed if it hits. She didn't seem to mind though.

They can also do this lunge-type thing which is about on strength with the regular Buffoon. That's not bad either.

Soon enough, she had her first card of the region, and a Brown Nightfox with it.


The second card was right behind that one.

Also like Buffoon, Beetle adjusted their strategy, which again largely included spawning somewhere in the lane and/or right on top of Celestalia. Strange how often that works.

But then she got her pattern down (guess what skill she's spamming...that's right, Arrow Bomb...again) and this was largely mitigated. At which point she took card #3.

Due to the fighting, some of the nearby trees started dropping fruit, and Celestalia discovered they were quite tasty - and also gave pretty good bonuses.


The red one raises Weapon Attack by 8, and the black one Weapon Defense by 15. There's a blue one also, but Celestalia isn't a mage so who cares.

The drop table for Beetle is pretty bad. There's another Green Wing Boots, but honestly, Celestalia can't see herself caring about that either.

So moving on.


Upon her return back to town she stumbled upon one of her alliance mates. He's a Priest who...wields a pole arm, and he's working towards a Horntail Pendant!? An insane endeavor in and of itself. They discussed some strategy and other things before he turned in for a nap.


She decided to go out the western side of the map this time, and found these adorable little puff balls.


As far as I can tell, none of them spawn on the foundation, which means this map is actually freely passable per the rules! But Celestalia is more than content to grind here anyway.

Also, the top two platforms are somewhat snipeable. It's heaven.

The first card got out in a flash.


The other Rash was not too far behind.


The puff balls attack by spitting out seeds, which are avoidable. As if there needed to be another reason to like this map.

But after that last card she decided to take a break and go watch a movie. And at that point it was almost time for dinner, so she just kinda stayed home until then.

She resumed the action around 23:00 server time, and had the second Dark Rash card within ten minutes. Ten minutes or so after that, she got the third Dark Rash and the second Rash card on the same platform.

Similar to Beetle, Dark Rash's drop table is pretty bare, although it does have the Red Falcon if Celestalia wouldn't mind changing hats...she's still thinking about the possibility.

Instead, she got a Red Viska.

Not sure how a few stripes makes it red, but okay.

And with that Dark Rash was done for.


Even though the cards were pretty imbalanced, that didn't stop Celestalia. She got the third Rash card not even five minutes later, and the fourth one in a decent interval - except for some reason her camera didn't register the screenshot that time.

Worse yet, their drop table, understandably for a Level 70 by this stage, has nothing for her.

But hey, clearing an entire map in an hour was more than a fair deal.


The Rangemaiden had a quick look at the upcoming maps on each side, and neither one looks too challenging. One or both of them will be covered next time! See you then.

 

​

PART CCLXXVI. The Duality of Empire

Spoiler: PART CCLXXVI. The Duality of Empire

The title of today's entry could be interpreted about three different ways. Celestalia has two different campaigns going on right now. She has two paths in this region. And the enemy she's starting with is:


Exactly what is "two" about them isn't clear. Maybe it's another transliteration issue. Maple has plenty of those.

Dual Beetle has a couple legs up on the regular model, primarily because their attack has a much higher range. But they still try to cast weaken on Celestalia first, which gives her plenty of time to stun and/or kill them with Strafe. Even if they do hit, it's still under 1k a pop. The real problem is that they love to...not get stunned and summarily thrust Celestalia off the platform...often times with her not being able to get back up there because of the weaken effect.

Ultimately what she had to do is leave one platform untouched and go around the others. Which actually worked to some effect.


Fairly good effect, rather, as in a flash she found herself with another two cards. Does anyone know what 'ecdysis' means? I don't. Are you really sure those steel skins are a natural development, book? Because I'm pretty sure there are manmade rivets on them.

Despite the fact that once again the Rangemaiden got shafted drop table-wise, it was another very simple set!


And that formed the perfect time to hop off and watch another movie.

Three hours later, she was back and leaped back to the west to face some nature goblins.


Dark Rash is in this map too, which may be useful if they happen to drop the Red Falcon. Or, Celestalia can probably ignore them if she wants. Her call.

These guys summon thorn bushes around them, and have a melee scratch attack which hurts a bit, but both of these are generally melee. Celestalia might lose her lane from time to time, that's honestly it though.

For the record, the thorn bushes are a SERIOUS danger. She gets pricked for almost 2,000 damage, which is well over half her health. It can, and does, blend in with the scenery too. Basically, she needs to focus - otherwise it's a one-way trip back to the home dimension.

Possibly the good news is the thorn bushes can be destroyed. Strangely enough! I didn't expect that sort of interactability from MapleStory, but there's a first time for everything, I guess.

Leafre Lawn Care, we take the horns out of your thorns. All your greenery shaped to a T!

In addition to these guys, they have some younger brothers who just have the scratch attack and otherwise don't do much...other than nullify the Print Screen button.

Second time this has happened in THIS REGION. Gotta be something with the air.

In her personal Judgment, she was quite tired of these shenanigans.

I forgot to mention she also picked up a Silver Ancient Shield at Dual Beetle.

Well, to their credit, Hobi was quick to apologize.


So she finally got a Hinkel all by herself! And if her history is any indication, this oughta be pretty darn good. How about one off from max??


As excited as she was to rush back to Orbis and farm some more scrolls, she decided to wait a little bit to see if Green Hobi wanted to drop a card.

And to their credit, they obliged.


This was followed by Hobi's second card, though they're definitely a lot slower than Dual Beetle.

Green Hobi's second, and final equip of the night, was another Level 70 arrow shooter.


Ah yes, the Gross Jaeger. Still one of the coolest weapon designs in the game, in my opinion. This is Celestalia's first - but not mine! It was a long time ago at this point, but Aescavon caught a pretty decent one at Dyle, as reported in Part 186, if he ever wants to get those last 5 levels and go beat up Athena. The one the Rangemaiden got here is 1 WA worse and I doubt all 7 60s would work on this to make it better.

And 90 parts later she is using the exact same bow Maybe she should go to Orbis...

Anyway, by this stage she was getting very paranoid of the thorn bushes and decided to turn in before she got too tired and made a critical mistake. She was already pretty close to death a few times - one bad keypress could have sent her packing. I feel like she needs to find some more HP somewhere...the question is...where?

How's that Viska working out for you?

 

​

PART CCLXXVII. With Subani's Blessing

Spoiler: PART CCLXXVII. With Subani's Blessing

This is how Celestalia's day began. The second step on the Hinkel's journey to relevance took a bit over a thousand Jr. Lioners. One more scroll will finally knock the BMD off the pedestal after three and a half years.

And then...something weird happened.

The scrolls stopped dropping.

Celestalia has had great luck in this campaign, as many of you know. But I really don't think I've ever seen anything like this. In 3,630 kills, she got three scrolls. At the end of the day, her total count since she started tracking was 7,829 and she was still at three scrolls!!!

So now I don't know if the three scrolls were quick, or she was super-dry for most of the day. There is no in-between here. Thing is, as far as Celestalia can tell the scroll rate is pretty much on par with equips. On the total list, there are a couple at 4, none above that, and most are 1-3; she has collected at least one of everything on the drop table. I suppose then that 3 scrolls isn't too far out of the ordinary. It was just a bit disgruntling how they dropped.

Nevertheless, it does give Celestalia the ability to earn some risk-free XP and refill her White Potions...and get a few cheeky Gachapon tickets.

At around 01:30 server time she decided to go back to Victoria to offload her equips - she had 19 - and after a quick stop at the Ellinia Weapon Store to turn in a couple pieces of clothing, cabbed to Henesys and strolled up to the Gachapon machine like usual.

A few tickets in, the machine presented her with an odd colorless piece of paper that seemed to shine ethereally under the late Spring sun.


Subani's sacred scroll. It was unlike anything she had ever seen. Of course, Celestalia had been around long enough to know full well what it did. But...seeing one manifest in front of her shut her senses down cold. It was a good few minutes before she was able to respond to the couple folks who sent her a congratulations.

Although somehow she was able to speak loudly enough into a Smega for everyone to hear. If this counts as a coherent thought.

She is an Auburn now, so yeah darah is technically correct.

While she was processing all of that, and sorting through the rest of her inventory, she was approached by an enterprising individual looking to take her manifold goods off of her. At this point Celestalia wasn't really sure what she was going to end up doing with the scroll, but figured that she would make sooner use of the money. In all honesty, she probably won't be fenagling with advanced scrolling until she gets her Level 100 equips, which is still a while away.

So, she did end up going to Henesys and swapping it out for a Pouch 5, which was going right on the FM. When she informed the above individual of the price, she was met with some hesitation, even though it was going to be lower than anything else on the market by a few million mesos.

Ultimately, the person did buy something else she had up, but not the Pouch 5. So the clock was ticking...especially as an upcoming magical sweep of the world planned for tomorrow was going to shut her shop down early. If it sold, she stood nearly to double her money. Would there be any takers?

In the meantime, there was one other drop she received that interested her. A White Adventurer Cape. It had two more Weapon Defense than her blue one, but otherwise was identical. She thought she might as well throw some scrolls on it and see what stuck. It turned out pretty well, actually.


She repeated this with the Dark Patriot, which she had wisely kept on her person. Only two scrolls this time, but one of them was...*gasp* a DEX 70%?? If it failed, she could have wiped out the hat entirely.

However, it did not fail.


It was at this time she learned that STR actually does boost her damage a little. Yeah, maaaaybe a few years late on that one, Ms. Auburn. Still, these two equips combined just barely beat the Beige and Blue (+8 DEX/+2 STR vs. +5 DEX/+3 STR). So, here's what she looks like now!


I thought it would take a bit longer to get used to the Dark Patriot, but I actually like it. Every equip she has is a different color...even the bow. It's brilliant.

And for the first time in a while, she was not carrying around a thousand different scrolls.

So, in summary, not a whole lot got accomplished today, but that is a pull I am never going to forget. See you on the other side of the maintenance with a new banner and, perhaps, a new bow. Stay tuned!

Spoiler: More Gacha Mania

For the record, the Oilers are still leading that series (2-1 over the Knights).

 

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SPECIAL XXI. Bob's Rebellion

Spoiler: SPECIAL XXI. Bob's Rebellion

Long considered defunct, the Celestial Signet (the Empire's newspaper) was ramping up again, largely by recommendation of the ever-indefatigable Erenell - even though he was quite sad to learn that his sister had relocated to greener pastures when off duty. Strangely enough, even though the central administration had issued a shelter-in-place order (as is usually the case during global maintenance), Kyrin's crew had still learned about several interesting developments. Such was what the editors were discussing, and noisily at that, while the Gunslinger was pacing the upper hallway of the Nautilus.

Curiosity got the better of him, and he nearly slammed the door open, shocking more than one of his fellow pirates.

"Oi, what's the big idea??" one asked.

"Anyone want to tell me what in blazes you all are so excited about?"

"C'mere, boss," another waved, nearly knocking his Brown Pitz Bandana off his dome, already leaning dangerously askew. Erenell made his way to the table at the center of the room, his shoes resonating off the floorboards with several stern taps. In front of him was...a picture. Comically blown up, and most of it covered by a green shell.

"It's...it's a Snail...THIS is what you guys are blabbering about?!"

"Na' just any snail, mate! 'Ats Bob, 'e is. He's leadin' a rebellion aginst yer sister!"

Erenell stood in stunning silence for a good twenty seconds, trying to process the stupidity of what he just heard.

"...Right. So let me get this straight. A Snail...named Bob..."

"Beware 'im mate," said another crewmate. "Ya kint just go 'round killin 'im! If y'do, y'lose all yer Fame!"

"Gentlemen, pause a second," Erenell composed himself. "First off, I haven't got much Fame to begin with. Second, if you can answer me, who else is part of this...'rebellion'?" That last part he spoke almost sarcastically.

"Das' the best part!" the one with the Bandana exclaimed. "E's got the lovey place with 'im, ind Thoiland, ind Toiwan, ind that place with the soder up norf!"

"I can only assume by the 'lovey place' you mean Amoria, and...Coke Town? You do realize the Empire never controlled any of these areas...right?"

The conversation at this point was long and irksome enough that Kyrin herself had walked over and carefully placed herself under the frame of the doorway. It was at this point she intervened.

"That may be true."

Everyone in the room stood at once and turned to face their captain. The one fellow's Bandana finally fell off and landed daintily on the floor, leaning up against the back left leg of his chair.

She continued. "However, Bob is very much here. That is to say, Victoria Island. Actually, your sister may already have fought him. You might want to inform her of this uprising the next time she comes to offload her equipment."

"To be fair, captain," Erenell began, "That is part of the purpose of this paper. Because she usually isn't-wait, Bob is real??"

"You haven't read your sister's journal that closely, have you? Anyway, what you say is also true, but that was when she had a whole entourage. I have no clue who she has now." Kyrin paused to consider her underling's options. "Tell you what...suppose I send you to her. Shouldn't be too far...I was pretty sure she was in Orbis, last time I checked. Or you can wait for her at the station."

"Aye captain," Erenell replied somewhat sheepishly, instinctively tidying his suit, even though he was certainly not going anywhere for at least another day.

"The rest of you, keep up the good work!" The crew raised a hearty cheer at their boss's approval. At that, she left to return to the helm.

Erenell was still flabbergasted at the conversation of which he was just a part. First, that there was a monster on this island he had apparently never heard of - and second, that anyone would think to resist the might of the Celestial Empire. Technically, Amoria and Coke Town were claimed as autonomous dependencies, so that made at least a bit of sense, but how two East Asian nations got involved he couldn't really fathom. He had his doubts that "Bob" was the actual leader of this rebellion. If the reports were anywhere near true, anyway.

That was something that only Celestalia could look into, provided she isn't too busy elsewhere. Although, Erenell didn't even know what that meant in her context anymore. If ever he felt out of the loop, it was now, which is remarkable given where the two of them came from.

Was there still time to change that fate?

 

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PART CCLXXVIII. Rise of the Hinkel

Spoiler: PART CCLXXVIII. Rise of the Hinkel

Welcome back. I am very happy to announce that the reign of the Bow of Magical Destruction is finally at an end.


The Hinkel only beats it by one point, but that is enough.


Celestalia intended to stay at Jr. Lioner to get one more scroll, but caught wind of something significant before she got the opportunity. Before starting, she was reviewing the Monster Book, (and by the way, in case I haven't mentioned it yet, she is extremely close to the Tier 8 Ring!) and noticed a ton more cards than she remembered being there. You'll notice in the background of the above picture that she's in Coke Town. It's one of the many regions that now have cards, and one that brother Erenell mentioned to her when he intercepted her on the boat to Ellinia.

The two had a lengthy conversation, mostly over him just trying to figure out what her situation really was. After explaining it to him in the bedroom of the Nautilus, he let her go to start putting down Bob's rebellion.

Celestalia also thinks Bob isn't the real leader. She may have the true answer already, but it will require her going down to deal with that individual...and she'd much rather get the ring upgrade first.

So, off she went.


This first map is pretty easy, it's three flat areas and two very weak enemies. So weak, they're considered red tier. And believe it or not, someone beat Celestalia to conquering this map - it's Aescavon! The Crossbowman, who hasn't been seen in a considerable amount of time, caught a second wind recently. Allegedly, Athena had something to do with it. She'd like to talk to Celestalia soon too - maybe there is still time to amend their relationship.

The first drop (not that there will be many significant drops here) is a Common Gach ticket, followed by...a weird coin.


There are two kinds of these pixelated tokens, the other being a gold one, which counts for two of these. Here's the really, really good news: If Celestalia gets 350 of them, she can finally get an upgrade to the Relaxer. It's been almost five years. Yes, it is possible she could have farmed a few bosses to get a chair, but for the life of me I can't get any to drop, on any character! Never did! This is going to be far more reliable.

Coke Snail, the mob not appearing in the two-above photo, yields the first card.


By the way, I noticed that the height of the card galleries has been steadily increasing over the lifetime of the journal. Weird how that happened. Anyway.

Coke Slime matched them soon after.


Sorry for not being able to see these cards really well.

To make up for it, Coke Snail very quickly provided two more. And both were fairly generous with the always-useful Mini-Coke (+8 WA). Celestalia has used them before, thanks to the first trip she made to the region. Don't actually know where they went off to...anyway, considering that Drake's Blood only lasts five minutes, and Mini-Cokes last for twenty, this would be the far better place to farm buffs from. Especially if Celestalia can make Ligator, who drops Elixirs, work. Of course it's not nearly as efficient XP-wise, but who cares.

What's even more advantageous is Coke Snail has potentially some of the best scrolls Celestalia has access to. Overall DEX 60% AND Shoe Jump 60%, which adds a point of DEX. I'm not entirely sure whether more Jump is good, but I'm leaning towards that it is. It's hard to play a character that doesn't have the mobility the Rangemaiden does anymore...including her Cardcaptor alter ego.

Might as well enjoy it now, because she won't be getting sets as easy as this forever.


She ended up with seven before Coke Slime finally responded. This was completely the opposite experience to Aescavon, who got that set done and Coke Snail was at least two behind. And they continued being far more obstinate than they had any right to be, but they were gradually worn down and finally taken out right at about 04:00 server time.


That was an hour after the previous set finished. She ended up with a majority of the seven equips it drops, and 14 Coke Snail cards, and over 20 hours' worth of attack buffs, and a little shy of 50 Retro Points. So the good news is getting that anniversary chair won't be a problem, especially if her poor card luck continues. But she'll power through, as she always usually sometimes does.

In the next installment, the Diamond gets added to the Monster Book Ring! See you on the next page for that one.