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Celestalia's Challenge - A Maple Journal

Discussion in 'MapleLegends Journeys' started by HouseAuburn, Oct 10, 2020.

  1. OP
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    HouseAuburn
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    10:39 AM
    [​IMG]
    PART XVI. To Drier Ground

    Enough was enough. The final Axe Stump card was clearly not meant for a half-effort. It was time to go all in and nab this sucker! Throughout the evening, Celestalia fought harder than ever before - even than at Hill West - to finish the dastardly fiends off once and for all.

    Before she could truly get going, we encounter a problem as we made it to 700 Red Potions, and had no extra spaces in our Use tab. So we dropped a stack of crossbow arrows.

    Anyway, after a few minutes of somewhat-intense fighting, we meet a magician who appeared to be sleepwalking towards his 2nd Job advancement.
    [​IMG]
    I guess he's pretty confident!

    We helped him clear some of the mobs on our way up the map. He eventually chose to become an I/L, which makes sense because with ice you can basically put enemies to sleep. Just ask Aescalloss how well it works against Dark Stone Golems.

    The Use slot from earlier got reclaimed because we went below 100 Blue Potions. Potion use has been slow but steady during this phase of the campaign. Not sure how many, if any, we'll have for the 2nd Job advancement some ways down the line.

    Back at the top of the map, we hit a new high of 360, on a Snail of course (meat shield as I mentioned), and then find a strange stick:
    [​IMG]

    This was incredible to me personally because it's the second one I've received with max Magic Attack.

    Quick throwback for comparison, here's first-job Aescalloss getting his.
    [​IMG]
    "A wise reptilian-monikered stealth agent once said, "Knowing your enemy is the surest path to victory." It's also the surest path to saving the almighty Meso!" - July 26 2020

    Best way to save the almighty Meso: Play Celestalia's Challenge, where you have pretty much zero expenses because you can't buy anything. But feel free to choose your own starting city.

    We picked up a few more equips after that, plus a Gach ticket, but nothing really special happened. Celestalia was confident in final victory, and she was right to be - because just before the bell tolled midnight, we got it.
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]

    Final tally for us at this stage put us at 73.57%, 1,042 arrows, and 65 Blue Potions. This last number is quite concerning because we need to keep up with the Arrow Blow if we have any hope of keeping our arrow count at a healthy level. What to do...

    In the meantime, Celestalia went back to various places to sell equips, Etc. and grab her set of arrows for Level 26. To her surprise, all the arrows fit in one quiver! Must be one of those magical disruptions...is it still a disruption if it helps us? Another philosophical question, I know. Far too many of those in this thread already.

    After that, the long walk to the East Domain of Perion was taken.
    [​IMG]

    It was a strangely beautiful sight, given that she had been stuck in the forest for what seemed like ages. However, she couldn't go too far, for Dark Stump was blocking her path - it was time for another card set. Note that Dark Axe Stump is also on this map, however I did not come into contact with it during the initial walk through the map, so I will be ruling it as an optional set. Actually, I am going to try and ignore them entirely. Their defenses are even worse than regular Axe Stump and they will pretty much bleed us out of arrows within a nanosecond if we even tried. So the obvious answer is to work around them.

    Well, I did try a few of them. But in the first platform I got two 1s...so no, not going to be doing that again. Think of them like Iron Hook in this regard.

    The great news is (as you can see in the photo above) there are Snails on this map! That means lots more arrows. The other good news, there are also Green Mushrooms - so I could reserve the Grey Able Armor now if we get lucky enough.

    But after a few passes through the map, something strange happened. Dark Stumps were not popping up anymore. This is a thing that tends to happen on maps with many different mobs - when you kill enough of one, other types come in and hog the spawn count and there is no way to reset other than killing the other mobs. The Library may say that so-and-so number of mob spawns on that map, but that's really just a guide number.

    I think this warrants a 'special case' rule for dealing with this type of situation. Because when this happens:
    [​IMG]

    We really have no way of properly maintaining the spawn of Dark Stump. So, here is the corollary rule: If a mob in the path of travel would be blocked from spawning consistently due to a stronger mob that is not in the path of travel, that mob is also considered not in the path of travel and its card set becomes optional.

    With that rule in place, we get to go quite a distance, all the way to here:
    [​IMG]

    Just one map short of Perion. And yes, although there are Axe Stumps on this map, they are in the path of travel and so the above rule does not trigger. We will be getting our Dark Stump set here. That's great news because this map is filled to the brim with Snails and Stumps - which means lots and lots of arrows! With the Gold Surfboard, we actually stand a chance of gaining arrows. Even better, we can probably ignore the Axe Stumps too, since there are so few of them.

    So, Celestalia got to mostly plonking with a smidge of arrowing every now and then, like a true archer should.

    Although usually considered an easy set, Dark Stump may take slightly longer due to how few of them we get to kill versus the rest of the map (not difficult, just slightly tedious - but compared to Forest North it's a godsend).

    Fortunately we didn't have to wait that long at all.
    [​IMG]

    The very next kill got us card #2 as well.

    Even the regular Stumps were awfully generous, despite the fact that we already got their whole set, and we landed four in the span of about two minutes.

    Two map cycles later, we get the third Dark Stump card, and after that, another two Gach tickets (bringing us to a grand total of 12 so far, I believe). We also got a bunch of equips. Unfortunately, we ran out of space (and Perion is right there, ugh!) and had to leave several Pirate things on the floor. Well, at least the Nautilus gets to save a few thousand Mesos.

    Eventually, we hit level 27. By that time our inventory was so overflowing with Etc. items that we couldn't pick up any more tree branches. We decided to go back to Henesys and unload everything...this time with Celestalia making sure not to slam her head on anything. The journey back goes so much faster when you're jumping down the forest, and not having to climb up rope after rope. You know?

    That was all Celestalia could muster for the evening, a productive one though it was. She carefully set herself down on her familiar hay bale and drifted off to sleep for another week's rest - this time, a full week.

    In the next installment, we're playing for another drop table and solving our inventory woes, two huge rewards with potentially massive implications for our future plans. Until Friday, friends, carry on!
     
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    HouseAuburn
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    PART XVII. Perion Ore Bust!

    It was a chilly Friday evening but a cheery one for the young archer as she made the relatively long trip up to the Perion Street Corner to clean up the last two Dark Stump cards. We got some good news when we arrived, as another guild was prepping for a Pink Bean run! This time it was the Colors clan and some close friends. Celestalia kept a close watch on her pocket streaming device.

    At the start of the session, the device's other function, that being the pixel camera, was not rendering the pictures she was taking to document her adventures. She could take them just fine, but retrieving them for the journal was not possible. Fortunately, the issue seemed to resolve itself within about 15 minutes. A close call - I was about to make this entry text-only!

    Anyway, Celestalia began plonking the usual dudes with the Gold Surfboard. Before she could lay a finger on as much as two or three Dark Stumps, someone came in and blasted them all away! And they weren't even there for cards...
    [​IMG]

    Thankfully we didn't get cheated out of a card ourselves.

    Otherwise the night started very well...for the Auburns.
    [​IMG]

    For us, at least initially, cards weren't in great supply. We also got two scrolls, which pretty much filled our Use tab to the brim. Maybe we should use one of those scrolls...?

    Similar to Beaters, Colors took a huge amount of time to get organized. Here's hoping that actually amounts to something...in the meantime they finally got to enter at 02:21 server time. Also similarly, there were a few disconnects. Celestalia, however, was fine, at least so far to that point. So there's an improvement.

    During the third phase of the statues, we got a second Gach ticket (14 total).

    And in the fourth phase, fittingly enough, the fourth Dark Stump card appeared.
    [​IMG]

    It was WORTH THE WAIT!
    [​IMG]


    Never thought I'd get excited about seeing a level 10 equip, but I needed this in my life, and I'm sure Celestalia will appreciate a bit more protection for the torso too. So...now we need to actually get one. Yeah, I'll get back to you on that.

    Anyway, before too long all three of our Inventory tabs filled up completely. Equips first, then Etc. as we got a second stack of branches underway (there are SO MANY Stumps on this map, folks), and we were going to run out of spots for Red Potions in the Use as our last stack was over half full. We needed to get this last Dark Stump card, and fast. It wasn't really expedient, though.

    On the flip side, we were up several hundred arrows, and, as Celestalia quickly discovered, Arrow Blow was pretty optional here. So only a few Blue Potions were used at all. That said, she was growing very impatient. As I mentioned in the previous entry, this was a very tedious process since Dark Stump only takes up one platform. Obviously, it makes it worse that Perion is right there, on the other side of the portal.

    After picking up a third Gach ticket (15), Celestalia takes an intermission to watch the fighting at Twilight of Gods. Pink Bean was unleashed at 03:01 server time - pretty much on-par with Beaters give or take a minute. But it was clear from the outset that Colors was dramatically more organized, and Pink Bean was taking consistent damage despite a few deaths here and there. Then, PB unleashed Damage Reflect, and things started to fall apart. Could Colors beat the clock with these setbacks?

    Meanwhile, Celestalia pocketed her device and got back to hunting for the last card. Luckily, it only took about 15 minutes!
    [​IMG]

    With the Dark Stump card set in hand, we can finally enter Perion! This is fantastic for one reason in particular:
    [​IMG]

    That's eighteen equipment slots we get to free up immediately, if of course we are allowed to sell to the gentlemen in the Perion Weapon Store.
    [​IMG]

    As expected, we can't get anything really free in the Maple World, so a deal had to be made. But it felt strangely one-sided. Why? Well, the deal the shopkeeps propose is that they want to be the exclusive buyers of our Mineral Ores. In return, they will buy from us all Warrior and general equipment of our level or lower. The metal ores are always in very high demand in Perion, as you might expect from all the Warrior equipment that gets made there! So, we get to empty not only equipment slots, but a healthy amount of Etc. slots also get lifted from us! Celestalia agrees without hesitation, and the transactions are made. After the huge selloff, we stand at 400k mesos.

    While all of this was going on, the Pink Bean campaign continued for Colors. At the end of the attempt, they had brought the Fuzzy Fury to nearly half health...but not before the streamer DCed!

    Celestalia sighed in contempt at the lack of gud-getting in the streamer's computer, then put her streaming device away for the night. It was now time to go west of Perion and see how far our empire stretched now. On the way out, Celestalia decided to put 500 Red Potions into storage to give herself a bit of breathing room in the Use tab.

    In the next installment, we'll look at the current status of our territory and begin the hunt for the Bowman tops! Stay tuned!
     
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    PART XVIII. Avelin Avenue

    For once in a long time, Celestalia felt like she was in pretty good shape. I frankly had to agree. After completing the Dark Stump set, we sit at 3,500 arrows, with 2,000 more in reserve, 51 Blue Potions, an absurd amount of health potions, and a path to our next equipment.

    She also felt pretty good about being able to enter Kerning City's sphere of influence. But this platform in Sunset Sky is not great:
    [​IMG]

    It should also be noted that the map before this, Construction Site North of Kerning City, has plenty of Blue Mushrooms, and one or two occasionally get on the main path. But in most cases they stay at the bottom, away from our most direct route, so I won't count them just yet.

    With the surveying done, the empire now looks like this:
    [​IMG]

    As you might have guessed, the yellow circles represent locations for our next probable target, Dark Axe Stumps. We narrowly squeaked by them in East Domain of Perion, but we can't get to Kerning City without their card set, so sooner or later we will have to go up against them. I couldn't possibly do it with only 51 Blue Potions though.

    So the plan for the moment will be to go back to Dark Stumps and grind for the Yellow Avelin. When we get that, we can then go to Green Mushrooms and hunt for the Grey Able Armor. I'm expecting this effort to take us to at least level 29, but RNG might dictate otherwise. No way to know unless we do it, so let's go.

    The map we will be hunting in is:
    [​IMG]

    This is an easy choice as it has the highest density of Dark Stump, which is also the strongest monster here (the other is regular Stump), not to mention the platforms are long and flat. The Monster Book Farming Guide agrees with our choice as well.

    Celestalia was also happy with the pick, as evidenced by the high numbers.
    [​IMG]

    And wouldn't you believe it, RNG was also pretty satisfied!
    [​IMG]
    It's beautiful when everything sings in harmony.

    The Yellow Avelin nets us +6 Weapon Defense (rolled a 9, unfortunately, but makes sense for how little work we put in).

    It was now time to search for the Grey Able Armor. For this equip, we can actually kill two mushrooms with one arrow by going to:
    [​IMG]

    Celestalia knows that trees have monsters in them because several Tree Dungeons are mentioned in the Monster Book, and she did see someone go into a tree a few posts ago. This happened to be the first one coming out of Perion. The VERY nice thing about this map is it has both Green and Horny Mushrooms, which means we can actually work on a card set while looking for GAA. But the best thing? Both Mushrooms drop Blue Potions!
    [​IMG]

    The only potential issue here is this top bit.
    [​IMG]

    We could ignore it, but the grind would go a lot faster if we didn't. And we can finally start using up the huge reserves of health potions we've been keeping. Well, Celestalia gave it a quick try and realized she couldn't shoot from the left side of the lower platform. There was absolutely no way for us to get a lane up here. So nevermind.

    Our first equip drop was another one of those weird green hats like the one we got at HHG a while back. Well gee willikers, if getting a Level 35 is that easy, then surely the Grey Able Armor can't lag that far behind!

    A few minutes later, a Thief enters the tree looking for Green Mushroom caps. Celestalia is always happy to oblige!
    [​IMG]
    What an amazing hairstyle...Celestalia feels a bit jelly.

    She stayed around for a while to grind, which was great because it gave us more Mushrooms higher up in the tree! But all good things must come to an end as she got her quota of caps.
    [​IMG]

    She gave us a fame too, and also a buddy request! Our very first one! MapleF14 At last, Celestalia was finding her way. We exchanged thanks and the Thief left for far more important endeavors than whatever we're supposed to be doing :p

    Celestalia soon found herself at 50% and decided the time was ripe to rest for the night. Since it was very close by, she chose the Tree Tunnel to overnight again, so tomorrow we can get right back into the action.

    Indeed we will do so in the next installment, as we continue the mushroom mania! Stay tuned.
     
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  4. OP
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    PART XIX. Anne of Grey Ables

    When we left off, Celestalia was having a whale of a time with the Green and Horny Mushrooms. Although fairly expensive in arrows (we had used 800 since getting to Perion), the drops were great and it seemed like the Grey Able Armor was right around the corner. Or at least, so it would seem. RNG, however, had other ideas.

    Our first equip drop of the night was a pair of Blue Jean Shorts...from Horny Mushroom. So Green Mushroom drops stuff that's hilariously overleveled, Horny Mushroom hilariously underleveled. Great.

    Actual first proper equip of the night was, strangely enough, on-level.
    [​IMG]
    Of course what we're looking for is also on-level.

    We followed that up with another Thief bottom which was 10 levels higher.

    And the equips kept coming. Here's a Pan Lid!
    [​IMG]
    I swear these things are incredibly common in this era. I could never get one before joining ML.

    That actually might be useful to hold on to while we're moving around. 10 Weapon Defense isn't really sneezeable at this point (we have 42 currently)!

    The Pan Lid was actually the last of the equipment flurry. The only thing we got for the next hour after that was a Gach ticket.

    Early on the Mushrooms were fairly sturdy, and on some platforms we spent 20+ arrows just clearing a few of them. I think we had a critical 1 Arrow Blow at one point. Questions were arising as to whether our no-blue-pot strategy was going to be viable in the long term. The answer lies in the EXP rate, which was surprisingly good - 0.08% for Green Mushroom, 0.11% for Horny Mushroom roughly. We can always go to the Lith Harbor metro and get more arrows anyway. But ya know, it's about not having to walk all the way there, and then all the way back, which is like a pain.

    That said, leaving the top platform alone is actually helping us immensely by thinning out the rest of the tree. The only real problem areas are the very bottom (sometimes) and a small platform with two Green Mushrooms which would have been problematic regardless.

    Suddenly, a message heard 'round the world struck through the global broadcasting system...
    [​IMG]

    Beaters had done it. Actually, this was the second Pink Bean clear within the last day (and the server MapleF3). The first one happened somewhere around 16:00 ST. Apparently, though, that first squad failed to get a Maple Warrior 30 skillbook...and Beaters got one. You can decide which achievement is the greater of the two.

    It didn't matter anyway, since the skillbook failed. F.

    As if trying to make up for the unfortunate roll, Celestalia started hitting huge numbers, including a 353 on a Green Mushroom, our highest in the tree so far.

    To give you an idea of our arrow situation, at 75% we were in the mid 1700s. So things are okay...not great, but not Dark Axe Stump-level.

    Our first scroll from this map is Cape DEX 10%. That's great! Except...we don't have a cape and no real way to get one. Extra DEX will have to wait for a few levels. In the meantime our Use tab gets to be bogged down with six different Cape scrolls.
    [​IMG]
    "Ehh...what am I supposed to do with all these again?"

    Anyway, a bit above 90%, we finally used the last of the Beginner Red Potions. Incredible it took this long. But that's not all! We still have Apples, Eggs, and sticks of Meat from Maple Island that haven't been touched. Yeah, it's been over a month since we started...everything's still good. Promise!

    [Editor's Note: Please do not use MapleStory logic when determining if a food item is safe to eat.]

    Before getting to Level 28, we used both the Apples and the Eggs. That is actually quite good since we got back two Use slots.

    Our arrow situation heading into 28 looks like this:
    [​IMG]

    That doesn't look great, but we also have 4,000 in reserve. Something tells me though that this will not be sustainable after all. Maybe we should try elsewhere? What map has both Green Mushrooms and mobs that drop arrows...hmm...
     
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  5. alduin
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    alduin Red Snail

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    love this. this is what ms is about
     
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  6. OP
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    [​IMG]
    PART XX. Yellow Avelin vs. Green Mushroom

    You guessed it:
    [​IMG]
    Ever have déjà vu?

    Sixteen entries and ten levels later (sometimes I think spencil2 is actually leveling faster than I am, and he's 190 as of this post...), we're back at HHG. But there's a key difference: since we have all the card sets and we're powerful enough, the Composite Bow is only needed for the top platform. Everything else gets the plinkety-plonk.
    [​IMG]
    We call this a 'stealth plonk'.

    But as stealthy as Celestalia fancies herself, she couldn't beat this gentleman who appeared right behind her.
    [​IMG]

    He was wearing all Level 10 equips, but something seemed...off. Almost as if he was hiding something. But what? The two stared off at each other for several minutes without saying a word, Celestalia trying to get any sense of what he was really up to. Was it the weird boots, perhaps?

    Thankfully, another archer entered the map and broke the deadlock. Celestalia carefully got off the roof, climbed up to the top platform, and pulled out her Relaxer until the archer went up to the next area. It was time to go to work.

    Well, we got a pass and a half through the map before the stealth bowman began smashing everything with 4-digit Arrow Blows! Celestalia had to know what he was on about, and sat him down for a conversation.
    [​IMG]
    His mission is, to find the Halloween candies, and shoot them down. Sopwith Camel not included.

    Personally I do like the Level 10 male Archer top, it's probably the snazziest-looking out of the 1st Job equips. Other than that, he didn't say too much.

    After informing him of our mission at HHG, he went ahead and started clearing the bottom three platforms for us! And he completely tore through everything.
    [​IMG]
    The awesomeness of Hurricane still blows me away. One day, that will be us!

    With this arrangement (we did get to fight on the lower platforms a few times, which is good because arrows), things weren't so bad! And they got better when a Green Mushroom donated this piece:
    [​IMG]

    It may look like the same bow, but we actually got +3 Weapon Attack from that. It's like a whole new bow basically! For comparison, the old one has a damage range of 18 ~ 118. The new one puts us at 20 ~ 131, which is an absolutely monumental difference.

    A new top hit was only a few Mushrooms away:
    [​IMG]
    Our final top hit of the night was 417.

    And Uryu wasn't the only one helping the spawns either. An I/L Mage and a Hero came in for brief bouts of carnage too. (The I/L was looking for some Etc. drops and we donated what we could.)

    Along the way we picked up some interesting drops. We got a second Basic Archer Glove (only 4 defense, so no go), and even a Battle Crossbow. We technically could have used this with no restrictions...but I would have felt a little dirty. Says the writer who is using a Gold Surfboard for the bottom 3/4ths of the map. But hey. Then a Green Mushroom gives us a Green Bennis Chainmail...which is Male only. Dang it, we need the other Bowman top! Worse yet, that topped out our Equip inventory and we had to go sell. What a travesty.

    Some time later, another young Archer just starting his adventures came into the map to train. He was level 17, and still had the Beginner bow. Celestalia made the decision to give him her old Composite Bow.
    [​IMG]

    We gave him some helpful advice about life on the server. As we were talking, the Hero from earlier returned. He ended up giving us a Fame for our work with the journal! I can't overstate how much I really appreciate how many of you are enjoying the thread. Thank you so much! MapleF14

    So the big question in all of this...did we ever get the Grey Able Armor? Well, no. But we made a huge amount of friends, and for Celestalia that's the most important thing out of all of this.

    But there is always next weekend - and it should be a great one! We're nearly within an arrow's flight of 2nd Job...there is a nonzero chance we could get it in the next session. Tune in this Friday to find out what happens next! Have a great week everyone!
     
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  7. OP
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    HouseAuburn
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    [​IMG]
    PART XXI. Equip Drops Go Rogue

    Despite us still being in the Halloween Event, Celestalia was overjoyed to learn that one of the radio channels on her pocket receiver was playing Christmas music! She threw it on as she headed back to HHG to continue the search for the Grey Able Armor.

    Although cheerful, the young archer knew that a major test was right around the corner. The 2nd Job advancement was only 158.9% away. It seemed so far in the future only a few weekends ago. Could she get there in this session? There was only one way to find out.

    On our first platform of the night, we get a pair of Amethyst Earrings as well as a Cape MP 100%. That is our seventh unique Cape scroll. I'm about ready to drop the lot.

    Soon after, Celestalia took a bold decision. She would allow the Etc. drops to stay on the ground after her inventory filled up. The meso loss is fairly inconsequential...what we gain in terms of experience rate far outweighs it.

    Now this was bizarre. Look at this Orange Mushroom! I'm not sure I've ever seen one of them make it all the way up here...or maybe I have. I've been to HHG with many characters over the years...
    [​IMG]

    We had a Beginner on the map with us for a while too, so he took care of the bottom platform (thanks dude!). He left after a bit, probably to get his 1st Job. I don't play with sound on (and Celestalia is listening to Christmas music, so she also couldn't hear the level-up noise), so sorry about that >.<

    He would eventually become a Thief.

    Meanwhile, we picked up two Iron Axes, one of them from Green Mushroom. There are only two Level 15 equips we haven't gotten from them...the other is the Female Thief top. I bet we will get that first! MapleF3

    Speaking of Level 15 drops, here's yet another one:
    [​IMG]

    As usual it was 1 Weapon Defense worse than the pair we were wearing. Good money though.

    And then:
    [​IMG]

    That one was...2 Weapon Defense worse than the pair we wear wereing. Good money though...wait a minute. Strike that. Reverse it.

    So a warrior with a Pole Arm came into the map and was camping the top platform, which coerced us to change channels. But then she also changed channels. So we went back to our original channel...and a magician came into the map and also camped the top platform. So we changed channels yet again...at least we got some MP back.

    And very quickly after that, we ran out of Equip space. When Celestalia went to sell, she discovered that her arrow count had remained roughly the same. Feeling confident, she decided to retrieve her final batch of arrows for the moment (putting us at 4,465) and headed for the Ellinia region. The goal was to find a nice tree brimming with Green Mushroom.

    This one should do the trick:
    [​IMG]

    As expected, the experience racked up quickly, as did the Blue Potions. OHKOs with Arrow Blow are very common, as are two- and three-shots with regular arrows. So things were quite good. We were also able to ignore the very bottom of the tree, which was just Slimes.

    And to absolutely no one's surprise, I was right!
    [​IMG]
    We might actually get a Zeco before GAA. That guy is Level 40, FYI. I think I've said this already.

    We then get a third set of the Thief bottom. Note that we can't sell any of this until we get the Dark Axe Stump card set.

    Some good news, as our top hit creeps up to 420. But that was short lived as...
    [​IMG]

    Yeah, I think the Green Mushrooms are just trolling us at this point. But Celestalia is nothing if not persistent. The Grey Able Armor, and in fact any equipment we need, is not a question of if, it's a question of when.

    As Celestalia approached Level 29, no more equips were found, but we did get a scroll. Wanna guess what it is?
    [​IMG]

    Hint: It's one of the most useless scrolls in the game.

    [​IMG]

    Upon reaching 29, we sit at 3,259 arrows (2,000 in reserve), 83 Blue Potions, and a load of intangibles. Those are important too, you know. We put 6 points into The Blessing of Amazon to nab a few more accuracy points, keeping 4 in reserve for Arrow Blow.

    In the next installment, the final level of 1st Job awaits! How will it treat Celestalia? Stay tuned!

    I'm sorry I didn't catch your message in the previous post! I was already putting it in when you replied. But thank you so much! MapleF2 That is a very high honor.
     
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    PART XXII. The Battle of Southern Forest II

    So the tentative plan for now was to finish our current quiver of arrows, then refill and go back to HHG to finish out the level. Of course, if we could actually get the thing, then we wouldn't even have to worry about it. But that's RNG for you. Would it have other plans for us? Well...

    Celestalia was starting to get quite excited about the prospects of becoming a Hunter. It would be a huge accomplishment with everything she's been through. Going back into the tree after a quick break, she tore through the Green Mushrooms with everything she had.

    Case in point: We land a regular-arrow OHKO (250 on the dot) as well as a new top hit of 426.

    First equip drop of the level was a Leather Purse. That filled up our Equip inventory. Then we get a Claw scroll, which filled up our Use inventory. But unlike usual, Celestalia was completely unphased. She kept fighting ferociously. Typically averse to the taste of Red Potions, here she gobbled them like they were candy.
    [​IMG]
    Those eyes...I've seen them somewhere before...but where?

    I'm sure you're wondering if her devotion was rewarded or not. Well...

    A bit short of 20%, we're at 2,400 arrows. That is about expected, we're using a tad over 400 arrows per 10%. That should mean we get back to HHG at 75%, assuming of course we don't get the thing. Which we could! It's still possible.

    Shortly after that, we pick up something we haven't gotten before!
    [​IMG]

    A Rare Gachapon Ticket! I'm sure the Auburns are going to have a lot of fun with that guy. They have yet to get any of those fancy 9-figure scrolls people keep talking about though...not that it's been completely dry. For example:
    [​IMG]
    Don't be fooled, this is the only example.

    Anyway, moving on, Celestalia keeps finding more and more scrolls. The latest one, a Shield DEF 10%, wouldn't fit in her inventory. But she could actually use it! So she got out her Pan Lid and...
    [​IMG]

    Well that's fine. We didn't want to spend our luck on a fluke scroll anyway. Need to save it to get the thing.

    But we didn't get the thing, did we? No, we got...
    [​IMG]

    That does it, Celestalia thought, and emptied her pockets of the red Thief garments.
    [​IMG]
    And stay out!!

    So we continued fighting. At 40%, another check of the arrows put us at 1,537. Still roughly on schedule. Some time later, a Green Mushroom attempts to give us a fourth Red Nightshift bottom, which we leave on the ground out of spite. The next equip was slightly better:
    [​IMG]

    So that was nice, but this version of the Composite Bowâ„¢ was only 28 Weapon Attack. At least we can actually sell it...unlike some other equips...

    Well, it was at this time that we discovered our Etc. inventory was full. We had collected three entire stacks of Green Mushroom Caps. With a break in the action having been realized, Celestalia got a moment to look at the chaos she had undertaken. She quickly got flashbacks to Hill West. But something was different this time. And do you know what it was? Simple. She felt absolutely nothing.

    Troll mushrooms don't deserve remorse.

    So Celestalia left the tree and went to Ellinia and Perion to empty her tabs as much as she could. We now sit at 564k mesos. What does that mean? Well, nothing yet. Who knows what opportunities await us though.

    Almost without skipping a beat, our heroine went right back into the tree and continued blasting away.

    At 47.46%, we hit an important milestone: A full stack of Blue Potions!
    [​IMG]
    Now we're gettin' somewhere!

    The rate of Blue Potions has been surprisingly good here. What hasn't been so great is the rate of getting the thing.

    At 60%, we're in the mid-600s. So yeah, 75% is pretty much exactly where we're going to land. [Editor's Note: I had to rewrite part of this line for continuity reasons. >.<]

    But through all the hubbub about arrow count, potions, bad equip drop RNG, and so on...Celestalia was very in the zone, calm and collected. She'd never really felt like this before. Almost as if she could go on forever doing this. And it was looking that way up until the very last arrows.

    At the tail end of the engagement, the greatest trolling of the night happened with this drop!
    [​IMG]

    A second Grey Able Skirt. The absolute tease! Well, the joke was on them, because we now get 1 more point of Weapon Defense. Hah hah?

    Yet the fight continued on. And after what seemed like an eternity, Celestalia reached 75%. She was down to 16 arrows.

    Upon exiting the tree, she fell down to simply catch her breath. Everything hurt - her fingers were about ready to give out, her neck was sore (whose wouldn't after that much archery?), and, of course, she had a multitude of scrapes and bruises dealt to her by the Green Mushrooms.
    [​IMG]

    I must hand it to them; the Green Mushrooms are a truly tenacious and steadfast adversary. The largest battle of the campaign so far is over, but our war with them continues. It has been a worthy honor. The Grey Able Armor will be plucked from their clutches in due time, and while we still have room on this side of the 2nd Job advancement to get it, it's looking incredibly unlikely given what we've witnessed here. But I have a saying that I've gathered from several months of hunting equips like this: It looks unlikely until it suddenly isn't. Like a thunderbolt, the Bowman top will manifest before us. You'll know when it happens. That is my guarantee.

    With the conclusion of this entry, we must say goodbye to a very old friend. We have had this skirt since Part IV when we got it at HHG. Now that we've obtained the 13 WDef one, we now leave this garment in the care of Sam.
    [​IMG]
    Big sawute

    Now it was time for some well-deserved R&R, or maybe just rest because it's difficult to relax when you're sleeping on a hay bale. Also, the fact that tomorrow night was going to be very, very special loomed large...

    In the next installment, Celestalia takes a pivotal step in her grand journey. Please stay tuned!
     
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    Scared to interrupt flow but I should confess that I started to love his storytelling.
    This really heals me from sweating ML life. always huge appreciate for you.
     
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    PART XXIII. Huntress

    25%.

    That was all that separated Celestalia from the coveted 2nd Job advancement. By hook or by crook (cause, well, bows have crooks in them), it was going to be achieved here and now.

    After getting her latest batch of 2,000 arrows, Celestalia went to HHG and found that the place was packed!
    [​IMG]
    "Just like the old days eh?" - Pastasauce

    We hunted with everyone for a bit (after getting their approval, of course).

    The next half an hour was filled with chitchat and us continuing our eternal struggle with Green Mushrooms. We actually did not go down the map, which, you know, the arrows are kind of the reason we're here. But I guess we're okay for now.

    After a little while, a young magician entered the map. It's his first day! We ended up giving him our Pan Lid. Celestalia really wasn't using hers much anyway. Didn't capture the exchange sadly >.<

    The crew was soon whittled down to Celestalia, the aforementioned magician, and his F/P friend. At one point the magician went AFK, and Celestalia decided to go down with her Gold Surfboard to defend him. But the F/P spewed poison gas around him which was honestly far more effective. But it had the other effect of short-circuiting Celestalia's camera.
    [​IMG]

    Thankfully it started back up again within a short time.

    Well, nothing much of note happened as we continued going back and forth across the platform. That fabled milestone was inching ever closer, though. We did however amass 3 regular and 2 rare Gachapon tickets!

    Soon enough...
    [​IMG]

    It was finally time.

    So, let's get the clerical stuff out of the way first. Our stats and equips right now look like this:
    [​IMG]

    It's quite telling when our highest-level equip is 15. In fact, all but two of our slots are Level 15. Damage isn't fantastic, which is to be expected when our bow is 3 tiers behind. That said, we've got to make do with what we've got.

    Second, we refilled our arrows again. We're currently sitting at 2,934. That's enough for what's coming, but we're going to be camping at HHG for quite a while still, I reckon. But Celestalia is okay with that. Also, we have 125 Blue Potions. That will be more than enough too. At least, I hope.

    Third, since we've hit Level 30, we can purchase a row of inventory slots! We're going to hold off on choosing which one until Athena gives us some rows at the job advancement.

    Finally, we distribute the rest of our SP. Three more go into The Blessing of Amazon; Arrow Blow gets maxed at long last (-14 MP for 260% damage).

    Celestalia walks with understandable tension to the Bowman Instructional School, where the Majestic Matriarch was waiting.
    [​IMG]

    Here is what she had to say to us:
    [​IMG]

    Clearly, she was more confident in Celestalia's abilities than Celestalia herself. What would normally be a simple test...well, again, our bow is 3 tiers behind level.

    After Celestalia accepts her offer, Athena gives us a letter and directs us to a map we've never been to before:
    [​IMG]

    It is fortunate that we can actually access this map. There are two mobs here which we don't have the card set for (one is on screen...the other we can't fight at all). While the rules prevent us from going to the next map, they don't prevent us from going around the map. So we got away with that one.

    Celestalia soon meets up with the Job Instructor.
    [​IMG]
    I want one of those hats...

    She tells us that we will go to a special map and farm Dark Marbles, of which we need 30. Shouldn't be too bad. But when Celestalia got in there, it was a dark and foreboding place, filled with monsters she had never even seen before!
    [​IMG]

    Celestalia hesitantly climbed down the rope to begin her mission. Below her immediately was one of the yellow lizard things which was hopping around everywhere. Worse yet, they hit extremely hard.
    [​IMG]
    When the plonker herself gets plonked.

    Her first shot hit for 167. It was maybe a sixth of the monster's total health. But she soldiered on. Thankfully, there were a multitude of ropes around the map that let her hop over the monsters when they passed underneath. Using this method, she didn't take much damage, and could ping the monsters over time.
    [​IMG]

    After a few kills, Celestalia gets the first of thirty marbles.
    [​IMG]

    She eventually found out that the first platform was the most optimal, having only three Evil Eyes and being of decent length. Also, it looked like the far right side of the platform was...a sniping location? The monsters weren't going all the way to that side.
    [​IMG]
    The Eye of Amazon also lets you scope out sniping locations!

    After this discovery was made, the rest of the test was a breeze. All in all, we used 284 arrows, 27 Blue Potions, and a few dozen Red Potions. Not bad! We hand over the Marbles and exit the tunnel victorious. It was a quick walk back to Athena.
    [​IMG]

    The final test was presented us: Choose the correct job title...
    [​IMG]

    We very carefully moused over the 'Hunter' option...and unfortunately Athena's window blocked the advancement animation.
    [​IMG]

    But pulling the window away, Celestalia finds that her hair too has advanced!
    [​IMG]
    Let's hope this doesn't turn into a theme...

    In the next installment, we'll look at the possible SP distributions we can take, and get into the 2nd Job action. Stay tuned!

    You will never interrupt the flow! I'm so happy this does so much for you. I appreciate you much more SlimeGrin and there will be much more to come!
     
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  11. OP
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    [​IMG]

    PART XXIV. The Hunt Begins Again

    Celestalia is officially a Hunter. That means two things. #1, we can purchase our first row of inventory slots, which we will do now. Athena gave us an Etc. row, so we are going to buy a Use row - because scrolls are the bane of my existence right about now.

    #2, we need a roadmap for our skill distribution. Now, there are a few ways we can go about this. The skills open to us are:
    [​IMG]
    This picture has been edited to show all skills. The window normally only shows four.

    In my opinion, the most important skill here has to be Soul Arrow. It's an ability that allows you to use the bow without using up arrows. This is huge; as we only get 2,000 arrows per level, it's going to be problematic going forward if we can't level up fast enough...and already we're overextending the supply. Soul Arrow means we don't have to worry about that anymore. Of course, being the most important skill it is doubly-locked. It requires 5 Bow Booster to unlock...which requires 5 Bow Mastery to unlock. Therefore, we would have to go all the way to Level 34 before we could start using it.

    On the other hand, there is Arrow Bomb. We can put 1 point in this and start attacking multiple mobs at once. At level 1, it costs 14 MP (same as Arrow Blow) and deals 72% damage per arrow. If you have a Crossbowman, you might know that Iron Arrow gets less effective the more mobs it goes through. Not so for Arrow Bomb; the explosion affects all mobs equally. But is it worth it? No. The reason is simple: Our Bow just isn't powerful enough to justify having it. We'll revisit Arrow Bomb later, once our damage gets up to speed (if it ever does...)

    Power Knockback is interesting, but its effects are far too small to give us a meaningful advantage at this stage.

    Finally (no pun intended), Final Attack I am not going to use because it's too unpredictable and something about it interrupting the flow of archery or something? Dunno, I've just heard bad things about it.

    So, I think the way we're going to handle this is:
    Bow Mastery x5
    Bow Booster x5
    Soul Arrow x6 (this will give us 3 minutes of Soul Arrow per cast, which is 15 MP)
    Bow Mastery x15
    Arrow Bomb x20
    Power Knockback x20
    Soul Arrow x14
    Bow Booster x15

    ...which takes us to 110 points. The other 11 can go basically wherever (most likely I will put them all into Focus).

    With the first point put into Bow Mastery, our minimum damage jumps from 22 to 27. Pretty good, and there will be more where that came from soon enough. So let's get back to HHG and get Hunting!
    [​IMG]
    It's 2nd Job and there's still no Critical Plonk skill! Don't tell the Surfboard, but its days are numbered...

    Bow Mastery makes it a lot easier to hit big numbers. But having maxed Arrow Blow probably affects the balance of power more right now:
    [​IMG]

    That beat our previous top hit by 44 points.

    While we were writing the entry, a Thief came into the map and challenged the Green Mushrooms. They weren't appreciative and took her down. Tenacious as ever! In response, Celestalia cleared out the platform.

    A few other people did go in and out of the map though. One was a Thief with no armor on. We found a Blue One-Lined T-Shirt with max Weapon Defense (13) and so we gave it to him.

    But the trolling continued...
    [​IMG]

    Now this one had +5 MP instead of +4 MP. So once again the Green Mushrooms played themselves. Hoo hah!?

    The Thief we gave the T-shirt to asked for a donation for taxi expenses. Having nothing else to do with money at the moment, Celestalia answered the call.

    And the RNG was deeply moved by our generosity.
    [​IMG]

    AT LONG LAST THE WAR IS OVER.

    But perhaps they did get the last laugh after all. The one they gave us was 12 Weapon Defense and no DEX - the absolute worst stats possible. CURSE YOU GREEN MUSHROOM!

    Celestalia was satisfied anyway and went back to the Weapon Store to sell and take a quick break. She decided to spend the rest of the session near Lith Harbor and gather arrows in preparation for our next move. The map we ended up going with sounds unintuitive, but...
    [​IMG]

    This map is actually great because there are tons of regular Snails, and also sniping locations. On the other maps you get knocked around a ton. You still do here, just not as often. The only other difference is there are Stumps too. But everything is a OHP at this stage. You should know what OHP stands for. At the end of the day though I think it comes down to personal preference...and this isn't an often-used map, so I'd love to give it a spot in the limelight for once.

    We start out by nailing these in rapid succession:
    [​IMG]

    The first one we actually didn't get here, we got it one map over while I was clearing a platform for our next banner. See, these things are easy to get when you already have them...maybe we should go back to HHG and find a better Grey Able Armor?

    Ya know, now that I think about it, Athena mentioned something to us about "not wasting our new powers on weaklings" or something like that. I mean...we put our first skill point into Bow Mastery, not Plonk Mastery. So we're not technically ignoring her, right?

    After a while we picked up another Composite Plonk.
    [​IMG]

    This one was only 38 Weapon Attack (ours is 41), but it had +6 Jump.

    Celestalia decided to grind until 07:00 server time, and then left for Henesys. Along the way she picked up a few more batches, finally settling on 3,480 arrows. Not bad! We might have to do this a few more times though...we'll see.

    Our next step will be an interesting one. We've got a few choices, and we've got a full week to figure out whom to tackle next. I think I know the answer - the bigger question is, does Celestalia know?

    As always, thanks for tuning in to Celestalia's Challenge, and see you on Friday!
     
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    Due to Thanksgiving, I have decided to publish this one early. Also...well, I sort of did the thing that I wasn't supposed to do, which was accidentally look at something in the Library. It was an accident! SlimeSweat2 But a very happy one, as you will see shortly.
    SPECIAL III. A Path Less Traveled

    If she was being honest with herself, Celestalia was starting to feel a bit silly, still sleeping in the aft of the Weapon Store as a 2nd Job. And although other adventurers were very understanding, it was difficult to get any of the established persons of Henesys to take her seriously.

    Maybe the low level of her equipment had something to do with that.

    Celestalia surmised that the monsters she was about to face would have some new pieces to divulge. That was her problem - she couldn't for the life of her decide which one to strike first.

    As far as she knew, there were three choices. The first, Dark Axe Stump, was important for getting her access to Kerning City. But it was just too hardy to be bothered by her right about now. As much as Celestalia wanted to fight it, she knew she couldn't just yet.

    The second was Horny Mushroom. She did well enough against them in Ellinia, and she definitely had the firepower at this stage to dispatch them reliably. How would it benefit her, though? They weren't found anywhere on the main road between the cities. Also, their defenses, while not nearly as strong as Dark Axe Stump, were still formidable.

    The third was Blue Mushroom. They certainly looked squishy enough - perfect for Celestalia to train on at this juncture. That said, the part of the road they were on was shared by many other monsters too. That is, unless she wanted to fight them at Road to the Dungeon instead. A possibility...

    Road to the Dungeon. Ever since she went there to take the Hunter test, Celestalia was intrigued by the Bowman Instructor. It was that hat! Celestalia was enjoying her Winter Hat, but it was offering her no favors in terms of reputation. She needed an upgrade, and quickly.

    Celestalia strolled over to Sam's counter, where once again he was unboxing and hanging piles of earrings. The Blue Feather Hat was dangling on a hook a few feet to his right. It was the same hat the Bowman Instructor donned.

    "Hey Sam?" Celestalia said.

    "Yes'm," he replied in his usual hoarse tone.

    "Do you know the Bowman Instructor?"

    "Sure I do. She comes in every so often to look at our new stocks."

    "Really? If that's the case," Celestalia said quizzically, "why does she still have a Level 15 hat? If she's...you know, high level and all."

    "Oh, you mean this?" Sam reached to the left side of his table and grabbed something from a shelf underneath. Pulling it out, it was another Blue Feather Hat. It appeared to have several battle scars on it, including a green imprint at the brim in the shape of a leaf. Celestalia's eyes lit up at the sight of it.

    "This was her first hat of the sort," Sam began, "She hunted it herself. It was a long time ago...she trades her hats in every so often when they get too beat up. I kept this one on her request."

    "What's with the leaf?" Celestalia asked, fixated on the imprint.

    "Ah, oh...let's see..." Sam tapered off, trying to remember what the lady told him all those years ago. "I think she said it came from the monster she slew to get it."

    "What monster?"

    "Hmm, ah. It was...uh...well, some kind of..." Sam scratched his head furiously, trying to recall what exactly he heard.

    "Was it some kind of Stump?" Celestalia asked. She knew it couldn't be Dark Stump, which drops Leafs, but no hat. Stumps and Axe Stumps drop no greenery at all. And Dark Axe Stumps weren't known for their moisture content. But that was all four of them...or so she thought!

    "Ah! Yes, I believe...a Stump...a special Stump."

    Was there a fifth Stump?

    "Where can I find this...special Stump?"

    "Oh, I don't know. I haven't left town in about fifteen years or so. Maybe if you tried poking around the Perion area, you'd be ought to find something."

    "Hmm, alright. Thank you." Celestalia left the counter and returned to the hay bale.

    Perion? Not that she'd been everywhere quite yet - in fact she had explored very little of the region - but she was certain she'd at least found all of the Stumps. Well, she had yet to fully look into either Rocky Mountain. Nor had she been to the Deep Valley. Was there another path she had missed? Celestalia planned to spend part of the next weekend searching the area for this new Stump. Then when she got a bit more powerful, she'd go back there and grab her own hat. For now, Celestalia would focus on the remaining Mushrooms. She also felt like the decision on which one to start with wasn't too far off...
     
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    PART XXV. Blue Friday

    As you might have guessed from the title, our focus will be on Blue Mushroom. They have 10 Weapon Defense compared to Horny Mushroom's 30 (now, yes, Celestalia wouldn't know this - but she is going off their fluffy appearance which is logical). Other good news: Green Mushroom actually has 12 Weapon Defense. So we should be hitting a tad higher. I'm reckoning we can OHKO somewhere between 25-35% of the time, more next level when we add 3 points to Bow Mastery.

    Analysis over, let's get out there. The map we're going with is extraordinarily close by:
    [​IMG]

    Among the myriad reasons for this: 1. Short trip to sell Etc./equips; 2. More Blue Mushrooms; 3. Sniping locations galore; 4. A lot of arrow-yielding mobs including Shroom and two Snails; 5. No Axe Stumps (Construction Site North has several platforms of them). The Iron Hogs are a nuisance but we won't be spending too much time in the bottom area anyway. Incidentally, we're about one level away from being able to 100% hit them (Required 95, we have 91). Well they still have like 400 Weapon Defense. Anyway, to the action we go.
    [​IMG]
    A good sign, let's hope that keeps up!

    After one trial circuit of the map, we pick this up:
    [​IMG]

    This hearty box lunch restores 500 HP and MP, which will make it extremely useful if we can collect enough of them! Celestalia wonders how much of the box was supplied by her family's agricultural enterprise.

    The first Blue Mushroom equip drop wasn't far behind:
    [​IMG]

    The Red Loosecap is Level 20, and that's great news - we should expect more Level 20 equipment before long!

    It might not be too long before we see the whole list though, as card #1 was obtained immediately after that.
    [​IMG]

    Let's talk a bit about our strategy here. Celestalia has several things going for her in this map. First, Blue Mushrooms only appear on about one-half of the map. The layout of which weapon we use for each platform is below.
    [​IMG]

    This means our arrow usage is going to be light. I'm not expecting to break even on arrows, but we shouldn't hemorrhage too badly. We will have to be careful in navigating around the Iron Hogs, but we have some help in our second advantage. The thorns on the bottom sectors, marked in red, deal at most 10 damage. So, we can intentionally run into them to save a bunch of HP. Blue Mushrooms hit in the low-60s as well, so that works for them too. Failing that, there are Shrooms and Snails scattered around that we can also walk into to trigger a hit detection.

    As for what order to do the platforms in, well, that's already demarcated for us. The small platforms snaking in between each large platform give us a path through the map.

    Anyway, it wasn't long before one of our shots unluckily found the side of an armored dude-o. Celestalia decided to see if she could roll any higher than a 1 by launching an Arrow Blow at him.
    [​IMG]

    She rolled a 1.

    After going around an entire circuit of the map, he was still aggroed on us.
    [​IMG]
    It was 2 damage dude, chill!

    Well we were able to work around him for now. I'll change channels if he gets too annoying.

    The circuit after that gave us the second Blue Mushroom card.

    We soon ran out of MP, and Celestalia decided to use one of the Bento boxes she picked up. I didn't mention this before, but upon our elevation to Hunter our MP jumped to I believe 573. It's at 574 now (because we got a new Able Skirt in the interim). For that reason, we can use the boxes at full efficiency!
    [​IMG]

    Biggest problem in the map seems to be the bottom right. There is a huge pileup of literally everything that forms there (Iron Hog + Blue Mushroom + Ribbon Pig + Slime + Shroom + Blue Snail, it's madness) so we end up taking piles of damage. That's fine though because we have a huge backlog of Red Potions...

    A few circuits later and we get Blue Mushroom card #3. This is turning into a quick set! Of course when I say that the next cards are always really difficult.

    We kept going for a while, before our Equip inventory maxed out. We were just about at 50% at that point anyway, so we went back into town to offload some of our gear. Quick check of the arrows gives is 3,102. Not too bad at all for just under 30% of experience!

    After the break, we'll see if we can get the Blue Mushrooms to give us their final two cards. Stay tuned!
     
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    HouseAuburn Capt. Latanica

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    PART XXVI. Behind the Signpost

    A few snacks later, and Celestalia was refreshed and ready to roll. She quickly strode back to Road to the Dungeon and went back to work. Not too much to say honestly, so let's hope for a quick result!

    During the break, the Christmas station Celestalia was listening to encountered some sort of issue. That was unfortunate. But, that meant she could listen to Eiji's crew beat up on Pink Bean. Would they beat the clock? Find out soon.

    We start the run by having a Bishop come into the map and fire off a Genesis to prevent us from getting aggroed by an Iron Hog. Thank you!

    About two circuits later, the fourth card is upon us!
    [​IMG]

    So what does the drop table hold for us?
    [​IMG]

    Absolutely brilliant - we've got our Level 20 Top and Bottom here, the Red Shivermail set! Both of these will be available immediately once we pick them up. That will hopefully get us some of that 'taking us seriously' that Celestalia is looking for.

    Meanwhile at Twilight of Gods, Pink Bean delayed his DR cast with about 8 1/2 minutes to go. That pretty much sealed the win for Beaters, and he was KOed with 6 minutes to go! They also got MW30 again...what do you think happened?
    [​IMG]

    It's okay Eiji, you'll get 'em next time.

    For Celestalia, the minutes (and Red Potions) ticked away with literally nothing of interest going on, although Eiji was playing some pretty rad battle music. We did get our first hit over 500 (501 on Shroom), so that's pretty rad too. But just as Eiji's stream was ending, we landed the last card!
    [​IMG]

    With this set obtained we unlock two new Hidden Street areas, both of which will be quite important! One we can't access yet (The Breathing Rock, which is one map away from here), and one we can...and it might be a very good idea to go there!

    Celestalia goes back into town really quick to offload again, then sets out for this new exotic location...
    [​IMG]
    Alright, so it's not that exotic. It will however be not nearly as painful.

    The Blue Mushroom Forest doesn't have any sniping locations, and we can't afford to switch out weapons here since it's easy to get overwhelmed by mushrooms. But that's also its upside: It's crazy fast if you roll high numbers...we'll do slightly better in that regard next level. That said, what you can also do, and which makes a lot of sense for us, is to ignore the top platform and juggle the rest of the map. This works quite well, in fact.
    [​IMG]
    Having fun up there guys?

    And even with the top platform taking some mobs away, we still lose our lane at times. That's how many of the critters there are in here.

    Well, Celestalia started landing OHKO after OHKO...at one point she got four in a row...and our collection of Bentos is growing very slowly. They were a bit hesitant to give us equips though! We did get a Gach ticket, but that's it.

    It wasn't setting any speed records, but we did get Level 31 in a reasonable amount of time.
    [​IMG]

    As promised, we put 3 more points into Bow Mastery and with the usual AP allotment, our minimum damage went up to...34. Ya know, I was kind of hoping for a slightly higher number there.

    Celestalia uses one of her ten return scrolls to warp back to Henesys and get some shut-eye. Before she does so though, she requisitions her latest batch of arrows from Vicious, putting us at 4,081 arrows! We'll see how long those last against the Blue Mushrooms and their compadres in the next installment, when the battle gets truly underway. Stay tuned!
     
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    PART XXVII. The Battle of Blue Mushroom Forest

    Celestalia was pretty excited. Another epic slugfest loomed large, and she was starting to really warm up to them. Now, given that, while she had gotten two equips in one day before, she knew it was not going to happen again.

    RNG notwithstanding.

    Eiji was back streaming Pink Bean again, so Celestalia naturally tuned in for more of that sweet battle music as she made her way back to the Blue Mushroom Forest to begin the engagement.

    Inventory at the beginning of the night comprises:
    4,089 Arrows
    109 Blue Potions
    135 Red Potions
    67 Orange Potions
    91 White Potions
    9 Maple Special Bento

    That's another great thing about Blue Mushroom - they drop both Orange and White Potions as well as the Bentos! We'll be in good health as long as we stay here, I reckon.
    [​IMG]
    "Run friend, she's angry!"

    And Celestalia was certainly ready to fight.
    [​IMG]

    First equip drop of the battle was a Mithril Pole Arm.
    [​IMG]

    A Level 30 weapon, it will be a very nice chunk of change when we head to Perion to sell it.

    ...We would not get another meaningful equip for the next two hours.

    Meanwhile, Eiji and crew defeated Pink Bean 5 minutes faster than last time. AND HE PASSED MW30!
    [​IMG]

    Soon after that, we hit 50% and we're still at about 2,500 arrows. That's great news, it means we could go fairly deep into 32 before running out of arrows. The Snails here are really helping that though - if we finish this battle early (we won't) then we might need to grind some more arrows somewhere.

    We then hit another interesting milestone - a full stack of White Potions! No clue when we're actually going to use them. At that point Eiji's stream came to an end.

    With no more battle music, Celestalia came off from her, uh, "berserker frenzy" mode per se, and made her way to the portal to take a break. The Blue Mushrooms were curious as to why she wasn't fighting anymore.
    [​IMG]

    Celestalia took out whoever came close while she pondered whether to continue the battle or go explore some other possibilities. This was a lot of fun, but after over two whole stacks of Blue Mushroom Caps, we have the pole arm and a Beige Nitty to show for it. That's it. Clearly the Blue Mushrooms weren't in a charitable mood today. We'll come back later when they might have more for us.

    We did however do well in our inventory:
    Experience: 54.63%
    4,089 Arrows -> 2,328 Arrows (-1,761) (43% of quiver used)
    109 Blue Potions ->
    118 Blue Potions (+9)
    135 Red Potions -> 179 Red Potions (+44) (500 in storage)
    67 Orange Potions ->
    83 Orange Potions (+16)
    91 White Potions -> 101 White Potions (+10)
    9 Maple Special Bento -> 9 Maple Special Bento (0)

    In the next installment, Celestalia takes a quick gander around the empire!
     
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    PART XXVIII. Reviewing Our Options

    With the Battle of Blue Mushroom Forest having been about as inconclusive as you could imagine, Celestalia conspired to spend the rest of the night looking around for some other grinding spots.

    The first obvious candidate is Horny Mushroom, who was the runner-up last week in the "Who should I farm this weekend" sweepstakes. Celestalia thus went into each tree around Ellinia to look for an ideal candidate.

    Well, the tree we'd be looking for is one that has just Horny Mushroom. The results of our search were quite promising!

    Southern Forest
    I. Slime
    II. Green Mushroom, Slime
    III. Green Mushroom, Slime
    IV. Green Mushroom, Horny Mushroom, Blue Mushroom, Slime

    Northern Forest
    I. Horny Mushroom, Slime

    II. Green Mushroom, Horny Mushroom, Slime
    III. ??? [Celestalia has not yet fought these monsters.]
    IV. ??? [Celestalia has not yet fought these monsters.]
    V. Green Mushroom, Horny Mushroom, Slime
    VI. Green Mushroom, Slime
    VII. Green Mushroom, Horny Mushroom, Slime
    VIII. ??? [Celestalia has not yet fought these monsters.]
    IX. ??? [Celestalia has not yet fought these monsters.]

    So it looked like Northern Forest I was the way to go! Even better, the population density there was low - so we won't have to worry too much about potion usage.

    Heading into the Perion area, Celestalia sees another interesting monster:
    [​IMG]

    As a test, she killed one. The Wild Boar has a lot of HP, but it's not terribly resistant to us. It might be one to revisit a bit later when the weaker mobs have been conquered and our abilities improve.

    But on this map Celestalia noticed something. There was another portal at the top! How she didn't see it before has no answer. But, the way was blocked by those pesky Dark Axe Stumps!
    [​IMG]
    Curses!

    We'll have to get the card set for these fellows before we can see what lies on the other side. It looks like though that this is where Sam wanted us to go to get the Blue Feather Hat. For now, we press on to Perion.

    At Perion we finally offload our Etc. items and a few more Equips. That put us at 777k - another good omen? A good portion of that came from the Pole Arm which was worth 22.5k! At least we got our money's worth...

    Celestalia decides to head into the 'dungeon' area to check out Deep Valley I. It was not too interesting, but the way forward was blocked by a pack of flaming Boars! We slay three of them, and find out they have absolute gobs of HP in comparison to their non-flaming cousins. No more progress can be made here, but we do get a White and a Blue Potion for our troubles.

    Finally, she went west to the West Rocky Mountain. The third map up contained a horde of Green Mushrooms! But the top platform of said map was filled with Dark Axe Stumps - once again the way was blocked. Celestalia carefully (or not so carefully - down jumping can be dangerous sometimes) made her way back down the mountain and back east towards Ellinia. She stopped well short of course:
    [​IMG]
    See what I mean about the population density?

    Back in Part XIX, we got our first taste of Horny Mushroom. They're actually not so bad, even less so when they're in such low numbers. We might use quite a few arrows here, but if we're going to need to recharge at Lith Harbor anyway, we might as well try for another card set and/or drop table. So, Celestalia got to work.

    Four levels removed from the first attempt, it turns out that Horny Mushroom is actually really similar to their Blue brethren. They are ever-so-slightly more difficult to OHKO, thanks to the higher Weapon Defense, but they do have 50 less HP. The most jarring difference is in the melee, which is much less effective. Still, we're hitting decent numbers.
    [​IMG]

    But after a few passes through the tree, Celestalia grew quite exhausted. The arrows were getting sucked out of her inventory in haste and with only about 5% of experience gained (that was honestly quite good), she knew she couldn't sustain it. It was time to return to Lith Harbor and farm more arrows.

    On the way, we stop at the storage and put in two scrolls that already had stacks.

    As she reaches Henesys, Celestalia gets a brilliant idea. She remembered back near the beginning of her campaign, when she first got her Gold Surfboard. There was a certain foe she fought that might hold the key to a better Equip!
    [​IMG]

    Mano. Surely it couldn't be that simple...but it just might work. From now on, Celestalia would grind arrows at Thicket III. She might spend a lot of time there, too - just to see if she can get something workable. The other good news, of course, is she already has one of his cards. Three more and she could see Mano's drop table!

    Now a quick question - is changing channels to search for Mano allowed? The rules are quite vague in this regard - if the fact that there are eight channels is considered an 'advantageous service', then no. Otherwise, we aren't obligated to stay in one channel. That said I do feel it is a bit gamey to channel surf, so I won't be doing it in this campaign.

    To speed things up a bit Celestalia decided to ignore all drops besides Arrows, Equips, Ores, and Slime Bubbles.
    [​IMG]
    A bold strategy. Let's see if it pays off.

    Well after about half an hour or so of plonking, Mano appeared after all.

    He was a lot easier than the last time we faced him.
    [​IMG]

    For our relatively simple efforts, we get a second Mano card!
    [​IMG]

    After this, Celestalia cleans up the top platform and heads home. By the time we get back to Henesys, we've made a profit of 394 arrows, putting us at 2,558. Also of interest, we gained 8% of experience! Ignoring the drops helped in that department significantly.

    We'll start next weekend at Forest Up North I as we look for the elusive Horny Mushroom cards, but we will almost certainly be back here at some point during that session. Hopefully Mano is generous - we'll see. That's all for now though - have a great week and see you on Friday!
     
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    SPECIAL IV. The Youngest of the Clan

    It was another boring Wednesday at the Henesys Weapon Store. Celestalia, having already established her plan of action, passed the hours pinging at makeshift targets with crossbow arrows. Sure, they weren't fit for combat, but she at least had something fun to do. It was hard sometimes, visits from Aescavon notwithstanding (those were quite frequent whenever he was in town).

    But this Wednesday night she was going to receive a visit from a different Auburn...one she had never seen before.

    At about 01:40 server time, a lowly Warrior walked through the sun-faded doors of the store, creaking as they shut behind him.

    "Welcome," Karl said on cue as he approached the counter.

    "Hi," the Warrior began, "I've a few things to sell."

    "Alright," Karl replied, "What do you have?"

    The Warrior drew out a Leather Purse from his pockets and set it on the counter. Celestalia watched from above as Karl took it behind and counted out 3,000 mesos.

    "And then I have this guy," the Warrior said, pulling out a green and yellow bow of impressive breadth. Celestalia's eyes lit up in amazement, and quickly she jumped down to see what the deal was. The Warrior shouted in surprise and staggered back a step or two.

    "Oh, sorry," Celestalia said, chuckling a bit. "I didn't mean to scare you. I just wanted to check your, uh, 'guy' out."

    The Warrior, still too stunned to say anything, got a good look at Celestalia and quickly realized who he had encountered.

    "Oh! Wait a sec. You-you're the girl my brother told me about! Are you her?"

    "...Who is your brother? Or better yet, who are you?"

    "Ah, yeah, my bad. I am Kalotora, son of Kalona of the House of Auburn."

    "Hmph. Another one, huh? Just how many of you guys are there?" Celestalia laughed in jest.

    "Uhhh...I dunno, actually."

    "My name's Celestalia. That's about it really."

    "Well nice to meetcha - oh, what did you want to see again? This?" Kalotora took the bow off the counter and laid it in front of Celestalia.

    [​IMG]
    (This photo has been edited in MS Paint to show all characters.)

    It was the Ryden - the Level 30 edition of the Bow line. And it was amazing in her sight. The intricate paint work and carvings embedded in the sleek and slender bow limbs were so pretty to Celestalia - although Kalotora didn't think it such as big a deal.

    "Uh, did you...did you want it? You can have it."

    "Oh, sorry," Celestalia answered as she snapped out of trance. "Nah. I'll get my own."

    "I mean, it's not a big deal if you w-"

    "It's okay. You can sell it. But thanks for letting me look anyway!"

    "Aright," Kalotora said as he retrieved the bow and laid it back in front of Karl, who counted out a princely sum of 60,000 mesos for the young lad. "Well, I got that one from the ball things in Orbis, so if like you really wanted..."

    "Thanks dude," Celestalia responded, "I'll be sure to be on the lookout. Night!"

    With that, she retreated back upstairs to the hay bale. Kalotora took his bag of money and walked outside, soon disappearing from the upper window's view.

    "Man, what a weird lady..."
     
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    PART XXIX. Horn Tale

    Evening folks! That was a fairly fast week. Celestalia agrees, since time flies when pinging at targets with crossbow bolts. Believe me, I would know!

    The tentative plan (or should I say 'blueprint' for you scrolling folks ;)) for the near future is as follows:

    1. Go to Horny Mushrooms (Forest Up North I) until 32;
    2. Go to Pigs and get three more Stiff Feathers (we have 1 right now);
    3. Get our next batch of 2,000 arrows;
    4. Go back to Horny Mushrooms until either

    4a. Our arrows run out, in which case:
    5a. Go to Thicket III and grind back up to 2,000 arrows (and get more Mano cards);
    6a. Go to whatever step originally sent us to 4a.
    or

    4b. We get four Horny Mushroom cards;
    5b. Look at the drop table for Horny Mushroom. Either
    6b1. We get something spectacular, in which case go to step 4a and continue until we get the items we need;
    7b1. If this is done prior to 34, go to step 6b2.
    or
    6b2. We don't get anything useful, in which case go back to the Blue Mushroom Forest and do step 4a as needed.
    7b2. If the Red Shivermail set has been obtained prior to 34, get the last Horny Mushroom card.
    8b2. If that is done prior to 34, go to step 7 and do 4a as needed until 34.
    All paths then lead to
    7. Once we hit 34 and get Soul Arrow, go to East Rocky Mountain IV and get the Dark Axe Stump card set.
    8. Go to Kerning City and offload our equips and whatever else we can obtain.
    9. Obtain all remaining drops we need from Blue Mushroom, Horny Mushroom, and/or Dark Axe Stump.

    The above could take multiple weekends, or not, again, the RNG will be the ultimate decision-maker, as it is in all things here in the World of Maple. Once we complete step 9 we'll have a look at where we will hit next.

    So let's get to it.

    Celestalia passed a lot of people on the path between Henesys and Ellinia. Two of them were perma beginners! One 12, one 18. Sirbeg would be proud. As much as she might want to stick around and hang out, though, we've got a tight schedule. So Celestalia soon lands herself back at Forest Up North I.

    Would we have any card and/or equip luck this evening? Let's see.

    Well it didn't start out great - for one thing we were pretty much incapable of getting a lane at the top of the tree because these friggin' Slimes are the worst. They need to go at the bottom of the tree, where they belong.
    [​IMG]

    But then we one-shot all four Horny Mushrooms on the left platform. That as it turned out would be a sign of things to come.

    The first drop of the night is yet another Cape scroll. We have thirteen total now. That's identical to the number of monster card varieties we've collected. Insane.

    Well, it was for about two minutes!
    [​IMG]
    Actual progress! Amazing to see, right?

    Well the Slimes would do literally everything in their power to make my life miserable for the duration of the evening.

    A cycle or two later on the same platform, our first equip drop of the night lands:
    [​IMG]

    The Brown Turk Gally is the Level 25 Pirate overall, and I'd like to remind the mobs one more time that we are not going for Corsair. Thank you.


    A bit after that we picked up the second Horny Mushroom card. Celestalia was so excited she forgot to take a photo of the card >.<

    The good news was at this point, we were only at 81% - about halfway to 32 from our starting point of the night.

    Our next equip was a Cutlus, a Level 35 sword which will be burning a hole in our Equip inventory for the next three-some levels. But at least we were getting equips - looking at you, Blue Mushroom.

    We then got another melee weapon.
    [​IMG]

    I don't know what her problem is, we can actually sell this one.

    At 91% we picked up two (!) pairs of Yellow Windshoes, Level 25 Magician shoes. Both pairs had +2 INT but since no one else uses LUK on this server, unfortunately they'll just have to go to the fairies' inventory back in Ellinia.

    Shortly after, back at the top of the tree, we find the third Horny Mushroom card. This time we successfully took a picture of it, which was a huge accomplishment.

    And a pass or so later, we get the fourth one. Amazing efficiency that we haven't seen since HHG.

    The drop table awaits! What do we have...
    [​IMG]

    Well, I can't say I'm that excited. We might be somewhat close to Level 35, but the Blue Pole-Feather Hat is locked behind a grand total of four other Hats. So it will be a while. That said we'll definitely come back here if we don't have a better Pole-Feather elsewhere. This one adds +10 MP...we should be able to find one that adds DEX somewhere.

    Since we got here so early, let's just get the last card. Surely it won't take that long, right?

    And...yeah, that was pretty painless!
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    Well, that at least makes up for the fact that I missed a screenshot! SlimeSweat

    Sadly, we don't unlock any Hidden Street locations, even though we should have...before heading out to sell our equips, we put this in the error thread.

    Since we had a nice haul tonight, and we're on a tight schedule, Celestalia uses a Return Scroll to get to Perion, then Taxis to Ellinia and Nautilus. Along the way, we dump our candy, which is useless now because who wants to eat Halloween candy in December? We only spent 2,000 mesos, but got a ton more in return.

    At this point, we were at 97% having used about 1,450 arrows (just over half the quiver!) and having still almost a stack of Blue Potions. So, being at Nautilus, we jaunt just over the hillside to the Blue Mushroom Forest to finish off the level.

    Looks like we finally caught the Blue Mushrooms at a good time, because even before we got the chance to finish the level, we got an equip, the Level 20 Steel Sergeant Kilt.

    Just as we leveled up...
    [​IMG]

    The voice of a certain Dark Knight rang out in the Forest, telling his companion to change channels.

    Thankfully he said which channel he was going into. Celestalia followed him and had to introduce herself.

    She was so starstruck she didn't catch a photo...somehow. But he was so kind to inform us that another Pink Bean run was coming.
    [​IMG]
    Good luck friends SlimeGrin

    Well. Anyway. After that incredible event, Celestalia finally assigned her SP (1 into Bow Mastery, 2 into Bow Booster) and at last figured out that if you don't have access to a high-level bow, you don't need STR. So we put all 5 points into DEX.

    On the way back to Henesys, we engage Step 2 of the plan and plonk some Pigs to get feathers. It didn't take too long, although the third feather was a bit evasive. But along the way we found these:
    [​IMG]

    I remember I mentioned back in Part X, when we went to Pig Beach, that the Brown Hard Leather Pants may or may not be Male only. We determined that they were, but at last we could get the final answer.

    Well...believe it or not, they did fit.
    [​IMG]

    Now. THAT SAID. They are the exact same Weapon Defense as our Able Skirt, and the only thing they give us is 4 HP. Also, they're not nearly as comfortable! So...I think we're not going to count this as a Level 20 pickup. Let's continue and get the Shivermail Skirt from Blue Mushroom.

    From that exercise, we picked up 10% of experience towards 33, as well as a Gach ticket. Finally, Celestalia went into town to sell her Etc. drops and refill her arrows.

    In the next installment, we're back at Blue Mushroom Forest for another epic slugfest! Stay tuned!
     
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    [​IMG]

    PART XXX. Return To Blue Mushroom Forest

    Celestalia was feeling quite confident that a major victory was on its way. And who wouldn't be? She had slammed through the Horny Mushrooms, got a critical level, and had met one of the most famous adventurers in the world - all in half a night.

    Well, she figured that riding the hot hand was the way to go. So, without much delay, she set out once again for the Blue Mushroom Forest. And for this battle, she was going to switch from Christmas music to the epic battle music - in Eiji's honor, of course.

    When she got in to the map, the Blue Mushrooms had set an ambush. No less than four of their fiercest warriors were guarding the portal, along with a stray contingent of Slimes and Blue Snails. But they were ultimately no match for Celestalia's robust archery. That said, she did take quite a few hits. The Blue Mushrooms are giving us a heck of a fight still, and that's just what Celestalia wants.

    It didn't take very long for us to register our first strike:
    [​IMG]

    The Brown Double Marine, Level 20 Pirate hat. A glancing blow.

    A few minutes after that, we get a new top hit of 511. On Blue Mushroom, of course. We increased that to 513 some time later.

    Celestalia soon lands another sweeping fade with the Blue Sergeant.
    [​IMG]

    Again though, it was only a flesh wound. The good news: At this point we were a net +3 in Maple Special Bento.

    We then upped our top hit yet again to 515.

    After some more fighting, another blow was recorded.
    [​IMG]

    This time it is the Brown Pitz Bandana, one step up from our other hat at Level 25.

    A bit later, the fourth attack:
    [​IMG]

    The Steel Fitted Mail, Level 15 Warrior overall for Female.

    It had been one hour since Celestalia turned the music on, and we were still looking for a decisive strike.

    But instead we kept hitting for minimal damage.
    [​IMG]

    With the acquisition of a Red Loosecap our equip inventory was full. Wasting no time Celestalia scrolled back to Henesys and cabbed to Perion and then Nautilus. She whirlwinded her items to each vendor and returned to the Forest within about 5 minutes.

    After getting back into the swing of battle, we get a fourth top hit of the night at 516.

    Following this, we have a long drought of no hits, but we do claw our way to a whopping net +8 Bentos.

    Two hours into the battle, the sixth hit comes:
    [​IMG]

    At that point Celestalia decided to end things, and fought her way to 75% before carefully exiting the Forest. We ended with +12 on the Bentos (21 in the stack).

    Well, the night wasn't quite over just yet. Celestalia wanted to get a bit of time in at Thicket III just to shore up the arrow count for when she heads into 33. So, after a quick trip to offload the Etc. again, she makes the journey to Mano's Mansion. There was someone there waiting (by the way - we were still on Channel 3 at this point, I forgot to switch back :p), so we just moved one channel over and got to plonking until Mano showed up again.

    There were actually multiple people flipping channels looking for Mano, so we hunkered down in Channel 2 to wait for it there.

    During the wait we picked up yet another Composite Bow. It was identical to our current weapon.

    Well, after about 45 minutes or so the dude finally appeared...and gave us absolutely nothing.

    That said, we managed to get back up to over 2,200 arrows. We got over a thousand from that grind, and we made it all the way to 93.62% as well. Tomorrow, we'll head back to the Blue Mushroom Forest to maybe finally get at least one of those Shivermail pieces...they can't hold on to them forever...you know...okay goodnight.
     
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    [​IMG]

    PART XXXI. Mano: The Cards of Fate


    [​IMG]

    What you are seeing above is the second Blue Mushroom drop of the evening. With that box, we have gained +13 Bentos from the beginning of the weekend. Now if this could only be a sign of things to come.

    Celestalia decided to put on Christmas music for this section of the engagement - since it worked so well for Horny Mushroom, the magic of the season might be enough to put us over the top and get the Red Shivermail set. Here's hoping!

    Well, the first equip of the night wasn't too far behind.
    [​IMG]

    Fork on a Stick. I don't think we've gotten one yet from Blue Mushroom. There aren't a great amount of equips left that we haven't received at some point, most of which are over Level 20.

    It wasn't too much longer before we hit the next milestone:
    [​IMG]

    Once again Celestalia puts 5 points in DEX and adds 3 SP to Bow Booster. Finally, Soul Arrow is unlocked! One more level and our arrow supply issues will be a thing of the past!...Mostly!

    A bit after that, we got a mammoth top hit of 529!

    ...Then we got another Steel Fitted Mail, before we filled the rest of our Equip inventory with Blue Snail shirts. During the selloff, we reached 1,000,000 mesos! Still not sure what we're supposed to be using them on, but hey.

    Time for one of my favorite parts of the Maple experience, math! No, I'm not kidding. MapleF3 Anyway, Celestalia kept track of her arrow count for a brief period of experience. She had 1,575 at 10.25%, and was down to 1,449 3% or so later. So basically, we use 125 arrows every 3%, and we have (including our reserve) 3,449 left. If 1,000 arrows will get us 24%, that means we have enough arrows at this point to get about 84%, give or take a percentage point. So we're just a bit short of 34! That's too bad, but it does mean we get another crack at Mano if we want!

    Anyway, shortly after getting there, we got this!
    [​IMG]

    Check out the stats on this bad boy!
    [​IMG]
    Just one Weapon Attack off from max stats...

    Anyway, we're going to be using this guy from now on.

    Once Celestalia gets to 20% (at which point she had 2,011 arrows), she pulls out her Relaxer to wait for Mano. She eventually moved up to the top platform, just to make sure she was close by.

    A Fighter came into the map at one point, and this happened:
    [​IMG]

    This community warms my heart. OnionF2

    Mano once again took his sweet time spawning, he used almost the entire timer...but it was worth the wait!
    [​IMG]

    And even better, we now had the timer for this channel! MapleF2 So we could pop back and forth between Mano and Blue Mushrooms for the remainder of the night. We should get another card in that time...or perhaps, something much greater?

    On the way back to the Blue Mushroom Forest, we get our final batch of 2,000 arrows. That freed up two Etc. slots, which is also nice! Thanks Vicious for being such a pal along these ten levels.

    Now, you might be asking "How could Celestalia know the timer for Mano?" The answer is Part VI, where we killed Mano twice in one session, and Celestalia was in the map when he came back. So she knows it takes roughly an hour for him to respawn.

    Back at Blue Mushroom Forest, we get a new top hit of 533 but not much else happens in the opening minutes (other than someone cleared Pink Bean coolmush)

    But of course our first equip drop has to be:
    [​IMG]

    Might be time to mass-drop more Thief stuff. It's getting to be that time of the campaign again!

    At 05:15 server time (about 12 minutes or so before Mano should come back) we head for Thicket III. Good news: Mano actually appeared a few minutes early. Bad news: We got absolutely nothing.

    We would do this cycle again the next hour. By the time we get back to Mano, we're at 56.94%. Blue Potions and arrows are both holding up decently well and we're at +22 for Bentos, so that's good. Sadly there just wasn't anything really noteworthy to mention. I think the RNG and I have had a bit of a falling out tonight, to be honest. The only question is just how long we're going to be gri-

    THIS JUST IN! We've received information about Mano's drop table! Let's see what we've got on tap:
    [​IMG]

    ...Yeah, so as I was saying, this might be a long, long series of sessions.

    Celestalia cabbed around one more time to sell her equips, and returned to the Henesys Weapon Store. As she was jumping up to exchange her items, her pieces of Aquamarine Ore fell out and smashed on the floor. Too bad - at least we get an Etc. spot back! It was only 600 mesos or so anyway.

    Our final act of the night is to say goodbye to our old Gold Surfboard, which is so ancient I didn't even remember which part we got it in. Turns out it was Part IV, shortly after our first Able Skirt. Man, what a fantastic session that was...

    Well, this night has been a disappointment. But I have good news! The weekend...isn't quite over yet, it appears - we have one more night to campaign! Stay tuned for a special Sunday edition of Celestalia's Challenge, where we will get one final chance to nab the Shivermail before Soul Arrow hits!
     
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