TeyaBrosna
02-09-2011, 12:45 PM
KP Weekly Challenge: The First Tempest Spine
No challenge last week, due to sheer laziness. I'd like to say that it was because of the server outage that threw me into such a funk that I was unable to pose a challenge to myself all week, much less meet it, but...such is not the case. I simply was lazy. This week started with the Superbowl for me, so I can honestly say that it was Darth Vader who motivated me to start challenging myself anew.
The formation of the challenge was proving problematic. What should I do? For the last three days, I have been running on Khally (the level 1 Rogue/9 Ranger Elven AA) with two other people and not soloing for the first time. My wife, who shall be henceforth referred to as 'Wifey' on her Pale Master wizard, level 9, and my best friend, who shall be called 'Clancie,' on her level 9 More-Hurt-Than-Heal cleric. We three girls have taken on some serious challenges (at least, for newbs they are challenges, I suppose) and come out victorious. Spies in the House, The Haunted Library, Xorian Cipher...all fell before our might with little to no difficulty. The embryonic idea I was nurturing had something to do with them...should I try to convince them to join me for a Chrono raid? I'd told them both many, many times in exhaustive detail how amazing my first Chrono raid was and how TERRIBLY excited I was to do it again... Maybe I should challenge myself to convince them to join me for the second Chrono raid? I dunno, I thought. There's Tempest Spine, I told myself. VoodooGroves and others said that might be worth a shot. But I know almost nothing about it and haven't taken the time to read up on it...maybe later.
And then I saw the LFM. "Tempest Spine norm, lvls 8-10." Golly gee, I thought, that's exactly the level range of me and the girls! I wonder if we could ride the high we've been on straight into a raid? (It should be noted at this point that I, though still VERY shy, am the most out-going of our little group. Getting either of them to join a huge PUG like a raid was going to be a challenge of epic scale.) I don't know what it was last night...the stars aligned, our Planar Gird-Chaosgarde-Chaos Band-pulling high was still pumping, the fact that Clancie and I had had energy drinks and had involuntary twitches going on, but *something* went right. "Would you look at that!" I told them. "There's a Tempest Spine raid in our level range, on normal!" They were easy to convince. Clue #1 that this was not going to be a repeat of the wonderful Chrono raid, because that is NOT normal behavior for those two.
Two minutes later, I'm whispering the leader of the raid, who shall now be called 'Leader.' "Hello there," I say politely. "I've got a group of three new players who would like to learn this raid. Myself (a ranger), my wife (a wizzie) and my friend (a battle cleric) would like to see Tempest Spine for the first time. If it's alright with you of course, and if it's not, that's perfectly cool."
"Sure np," he replies instantly. "Hit the LFM and tell the others to do the same."
Awesome!
I'd already made it to the guild ship to wait to see if the group was going to fill like I had last time. The moment it looked like it was close, I'd buff up a storm and then head in the direction of the raid.
"Okay, I'd like to welcome Khally-ope and her friends to the group, they're new so let's show 'em how it's done," Leader starts in an exciting New Yorky-type accent. I shivered with anticipation. "Is everybody in?"
IN?! As in, inside in the RAID?! NO! At this point, two other thoughts occur to me to heighten my sense of panic. I don't have the quest, and I don't know where it is. I have read almost NOTHING about it and am totally clueless. Clue #2.
Much to my relief, the quest is almost immediately shared by Leader. I sigh gratefully and see that it's located in House Jorasco. I head there as quickly as my un-Strided elven legs will carry me. At this point, Wifey (seated right next to me on another computer) starts whispering frantically "Where is it? Where is it?!" I get to the middle of House J to meet up with the first blue dot I see. It's Clancie, who appears to be looking around frantically in every direction. Then it hits me. There's no directional arrow leading to the quest. At this point I make a judgement call. I could stop and expand my mini-map and see if it comes up or I can ask real quick. In retrospect, I chose wrong. "So sorry, but where is the quest?" Groans from my speakers. I can feel the heat rising up my neck and making my ears burn. "House J" is written six times in party chat. "Yes, I'm in House J," I reply, starting to feel really quite idiotic.
"Okay," Leader sounded a tad defeated. "Can someone exit the quest and let your blue blip show up for 'em?"
Fortunately, someone already had. Clancie, Wifey and I raced toward it. (Although "raced" is probably the wrong word to use for how quickly I run. Doubly so for Clancie who has zero twink gear and wears full plate. Did I have Longstrider spell equipped to at least help myself out? No, I did not. I'd done Spies in the House earlier, so I had Jump, Ram's Might and Barkskin on.)
We all arrive inside the quest after following the accommodating blue blip into the quest. Several people also went so far as to helpfully explain how to find quests on a map. I was starting to feel small. Clue #3.
"Alright," Leader begins in a brisk-but-not-unkind tone. "This is how it's gonna work. Once we get inside, everybody stay right there and don't run off! If you need fire resist, step to the <blah> side, if not, step to the <blah> side." You'll notice I have not included which side was which. I probably *heard* him say which side was which, but at that very moment, something else became FAR MORE PRESSING. I had taken to my keyboard to gush out a "Thanks so much have having us!" When I realised that I had started typing without my cursor in that box, as has happened to me so many times in the past. I promptly began to auto-run...directly into the lava in front of the group. And now I had hit the enter key, so my frantic repetition of the directional "SSS" was dutifully written in my chat box and not determining my direction at all.
I died.
The obscenities spewing from my mouth (or "Irish words," as my mother called them) stopped abruptly as I realised that I was indeed dead in lava, little legs still pumping. My mouth continued to move but no sound came out, much like a fish.
This had NOT just happened in front of the entire group. "Server outage now! NOW. NOW!!" I screamed inside my head.
The groans from my speakers were deafening, accompanied by Leader saying "Uh, Khally-ope...what are you doing?! You're not supposed to swim in it! I told everyone to stay put!!" A couple of people blinked in party chat and others exclaimed in unpleasant surprise. I was oblivious to it all however, as my shame had risen to the point where the grey covering my screen was nowhere near dark enough to hide me.
"Alright, everyone recall out...we'll reform and try it again," Leader said with rising defeat.
And so we did. I release back to the Anvilfire Inn, near to tears, and start rushing back via the airship. My screen freezes while loading the ship. "No. No, no, no!" I whisper and frantically watch Wifey's screen to see if she's been re-accepted into the LFM, which has disbanded. She is accepted without hesitation. When my screen finally unfreezes, I hit the LFM again...and wait. I hang my head. This is not entirely unexpected. At least Wifey will get to-- Oh wait! I'm back in!! Clearly, this is a group with a twisted sense of humor.
I head back into the quest and am greeted with a barrage of helpful advice regarding lava. I am terrified to type anything now, and am FAR to embarrassed to speak out loud, so I merely say "Sorry, hit auto-run accidentally." Needless to say, it doesn't seem to matter much. I am feeling much, much smaller now. Clue #4.
"Alright, there are several ways up the mountain," Leader begins. I can feel my adrenaline beginning to build again. Just shake it off, I tell myself. Just like you did in the Chrono raid, keep up with the group, attack when you see someone else attacking, don't touch anything and keep your mouth shut unless you have something important to say. It'll be great. Just a minor lava hiccup. Leader, with several others chiming in, explains at the speed of light something about how there are different ways to do the beginning. Someone yells out "Don't follow me, I'm going a different way!" The group is Hasted. "Let's GO!" Leader shouts.
Within 10 strides, the entire rest of the group has moved SO fast that they are no longer rendering on my screen. (Game lesson learned: Haste must stack with Striding properties. Wish I had some of those. Noted.) The only character remaining ahead of me is a warforged who is BOOKING. I scurry after him, flinching as a I run through fire elementals. Having died, all of my buffs disappeared and the group didn't rebuff when we entered the quest again...thank you, Reflex saves! The warforged rounds a bend to the right...and runs right over a pool of lava. I balk at the edge for a millisecond and he's gone. I turn around to see who the blue blip immediately behind me is. It's Clancie; bless her heart, she's followed me. Glancing over at Wifey's screen, I can see that she's running frantically (much faster than I can, I might add) but that she too has already lost the people she was following. Her whispers of "Oh no, oh no, oh no" become desperate.
"Where are you?" I whisper to her.
"I don't know!" I can hear the echoes of coming tears in her voice.
I squint at the map and realise that she has rounded a bend to the left where I went right, and has run up some kind of ramp. I grab Clancie's steel-shod arm and race to Wifey's location. I pull open the map and expand it...nothing. Our three blue blips and nothing else. I can feel my own tears finally threatening. I feel a flush of embarrassment about it...for me, adrenaline + embarrassment + estrogen = tear duct usage. I know it's not that way for every girl, but it is sometimes for this girl. I didn't weep or anything and there was no rending of sackcloth, but my eyes definitely stung for a few moments.
"Oh my gahd," comes Leader's frustrated voice. "I *told you guys* to keep up! Awright, would somebody please go back and get them?"
In party chat, someone comments that even when they were new, THEY didn't run around randomly when doing this raid for the first time. A couple of others make similar comments. I'm starting to feel like I should apologise for all of the snarky things I've said about Christina Aguilera in the last few days. Smothered in shame, I say nothing. There is nothing *to* say. Several members of the party are clearly disgusted and are vociferous about it. One drops group. No one blames him, least of all me.
To be fair, a couple of others in the group chimed in with "Hey now, lay off - they're new!" I couldn't hear them over the ringing in my ears, but Wifey has assured me that it did happen.
We follow the group of blue blips through a portal after repeated admonishment from several members of the group to 'keep up this time.' "The map doesn't reflect where you are and it won't show your proximity to others, so if you get lost EVEN A LITTLE BIT, you're screwed!" I can feel the blood draining from my face and the ringing in my ears grows louder.
Fortunately, following the group in the tight confines of the caverns we entered was much easier. Without all of that open space, it seems that they were unable to hit warp speeds. I don't question my good luck, I simply follow, Wifey and Clancie by my side.
What followed made no sense. There was no explanation as to what we were doing, where we were going or why. We raced to a series of chests and got a bunch of loot. We killed what appeared to be very few things, although some members of the group weren't with us, so it's entirely possible that they were doing all of the killing at another location. Several members of the group talked constantly, often telescoping one another, and almost nothing they said made sense to me.
"Now's a good time to put on your water-breathing gear," Leader exclaims as the entire group leaps into a pond. Water breathing gear?! My higher level characters have that, but not this one. I start to panic. Wifey doesn't remember using her water breathing wand on me, but she must have. Only the two of us were remaining beside the water when the blue bubble enclosed my head. We frantically jump in and head towards the last remaining character that has rendered. We follow, grab a chest, and follow back out.
As we're exiting the water, I hear Leader call out "Wait, where's Clancie? Does someone know where Clancie is?!" I feel a white-hot stab of guilt - I had not been paying attention to my friend who was dragged here BY ME. Luckily, someone took pity on her (name of Bhaaam or something like that? Whoever you are, thank you) and went back for her, leading her through to rejoin the group. We gather outside of yet another portal and we all are warned repeatedly to NOT ENTER until somethingsomethingsomething. Awesome. I'd already picked out someone who appeared to know what they were doing, and was determined to not enter until she did. Everyone entered the portal except for her, me, Wifey and Clancie. After waiting a minute or two, she goes through the portal and we follow. There are things left to kill in the room beyond and we participate.
Things continue in this vein for another few minutes. My girls and I follow the group closely, attacking when it seems appropriate. Clancie threw some heals, Wifey threw some Hastes, I threw arrows. We all stop at one of what appeared to be many shrines and Leader asks Clancie if she has FOM. "FOM?" She asks in party chat. Groans. "Freedom of Movement," several are quick to explain. "Not on me," she answers.
"Can you get it?" Leader sounds brusque.
"Sure," Clancie replies after a pregnant pause. I'm relieved to hear pleased-sounding noises from my speakers. Have we finally done something right?
But then the group stops before another portal a minute or two later, and Leader asks Clancie for FOM. The pregnant pause resumes. After what felt like two whole seconds, I hear him mutter "Forget about it," and race through the portal without the buff. Others grumble as well. I feel horrible for Clancie. It was only earlier in the day that the three of us had discussed how to place and use multiple hotbars. Clancie and I had been content with three, but she had reluctantly concluded that she needed five or six and had changed it all around. I realise that this kind of thing is a no-brainer for more experienced players, but we're still getting used to all of that. There was little time to consider the issue, for after a few moments everyone started heading through the portal and we followed.
Before we had all entered, Leader (with others constantly interrupting) had explained in dire terms what the last room would be like. All I could understand was that somehow it was possible to be blown away. (I have an advantage here. I lived in Texas for a few years and am accustomed to the possibility of being blown away.) They debated the merits of wearing Feather Falling items, half saying that it didn't ultimately matter, the other half insisting that we all remove such items. I removed mine. There was mention of a puzzle that had to be solved before the monster could be hurt (I think), but that was it. Then we were through. Someone had obviously already solved it, because Leader was shouting "Alright, let's take him down!" The battle was fierce but brief. Within a matter of seconds, it was all over. I headed over to the two chests and looted them, feeling numb.
Leader thanked everyone and promptly dropped group. About half of the others followed suit before I'd managed to finish typing out my own thanks. Clancie and Wifey also thanked the remaining group members and we finished out. We all stood right outside the quest entrance, surely feeling as stunned as I did. Wifey's face was pale, Clancie was quiet. We recreated a team for just the three of us. Although it was woefully inadequate, I felt compelled to apologise for having suggested that we join the raid.
"The next time I have a bright idea, please ignore me," I say. "I felt so horrible almost the entire way through that I thought I was gonna cry."
Clancie, whose reactions to in-game adversity range from the Shouting Obscenities tactic to the Kill Everything While Shouting Obscenities tactic, surprised me. "It's alright, babe," she said. "We'll try it again some other time and it'll be great."
"That's right," Wifey, who is so shy as to have virtually no reactions at all under any circumstances, chimed in. "We'll read up on the raid and be better prepared next time."
Next time?! Clearly, while I had overestimated my preparedness and skill level for this raid, I dramatically underestimated the perseverance and force of character of my two girls.
In the final analysis, it would be easy for me to rant and rail about how awful a group it was, how unhelpful and unsupportive they were to us new players. After having slept on it however, I don't believe that to be an accurate assessment of them. While I *had* told Leader from the very beginning that we were new and wanted to learn the raid, it clearly wasn't the right group for that. They *were* trying to be helpful at various points along the way, they were simply catering to the majority of the group (as is only right) who were vastly more experienced than we were. In retrospect, it's entirely possible that they went FAR out of their way to keep us safe and alive the entire raid, and we never even noticed. Indeed, when I asked Wifey earlier whether or not she'd used her water breathing wand on me, her response was: "I'm sorry, I really don't remember anything between the lava and the end."
I feel terrible that I may have inadvertently ruined what was otherwise a smooth raid for the more experienced group members, and I hope that they too can look back on the experience with a forgiving mindset. We *will* be better next time and more prepared. I will make a bigger effort to find a group that is appropriate for our skill/experience level, and hopefully the fact that it won't be my very first time doing the raid will mean that my ability to focus will be higher. As Wifey is now pointing out to me, we were hoping that our successes in the quests we'd done would carry over into the raid...and it simply doesn't work that way. Lesson learned. Raids are an entirely different beast and need to be treated with the appropriate caution and respect.
I went to bed last night determined to delete all of my characters from Sarlona and recreate them on LOTRO. Today I feel better. Clancie has already talked to me today about the possibility of a future Chrono raid; Wifey is making me a cup of tea. (I type this knowing she is reading over my shoulder and might be inspired to go actually make tea.) The game is great fun, my girls are amazing... Today's challenge is to recapture the joy we felt yesterday afternoon after questing.
*straps on the new Chaosgarde*
Shouldn't be a problem. :)
No challenge last week, due to sheer laziness. I'd like to say that it was because of the server outage that threw me into such a funk that I was unable to pose a challenge to myself all week, much less meet it, but...such is not the case. I simply was lazy. This week started with the Superbowl for me, so I can honestly say that it was Darth Vader who motivated me to start challenging myself anew.
The formation of the challenge was proving problematic. What should I do? For the last three days, I have been running on Khally (the level 1 Rogue/9 Ranger Elven AA) with two other people and not soloing for the first time. My wife, who shall be henceforth referred to as 'Wifey' on her Pale Master wizard, level 9, and my best friend, who shall be called 'Clancie,' on her level 9 More-Hurt-Than-Heal cleric. We three girls have taken on some serious challenges (at least, for newbs they are challenges, I suppose) and come out victorious. Spies in the House, The Haunted Library, Xorian Cipher...all fell before our might with little to no difficulty. The embryonic idea I was nurturing had something to do with them...should I try to convince them to join me for a Chrono raid? I'd told them both many, many times in exhaustive detail how amazing my first Chrono raid was and how TERRIBLY excited I was to do it again... Maybe I should challenge myself to convince them to join me for the second Chrono raid? I dunno, I thought. There's Tempest Spine, I told myself. VoodooGroves and others said that might be worth a shot. But I know almost nothing about it and haven't taken the time to read up on it...maybe later.
And then I saw the LFM. "Tempest Spine norm, lvls 8-10." Golly gee, I thought, that's exactly the level range of me and the girls! I wonder if we could ride the high we've been on straight into a raid? (It should be noted at this point that I, though still VERY shy, am the most out-going of our little group. Getting either of them to join a huge PUG like a raid was going to be a challenge of epic scale.) I don't know what it was last night...the stars aligned, our Planar Gird-Chaosgarde-Chaos Band-pulling high was still pumping, the fact that Clancie and I had had energy drinks and had involuntary twitches going on, but *something* went right. "Would you look at that!" I told them. "There's a Tempest Spine raid in our level range, on normal!" They were easy to convince. Clue #1 that this was not going to be a repeat of the wonderful Chrono raid, because that is NOT normal behavior for those two.
Two minutes later, I'm whispering the leader of the raid, who shall now be called 'Leader.' "Hello there," I say politely. "I've got a group of three new players who would like to learn this raid. Myself (a ranger), my wife (a wizzie) and my friend (a battle cleric) would like to see Tempest Spine for the first time. If it's alright with you of course, and if it's not, that's perfectly cool."
"Sure np," he replies instantly. "Hit the LFM and tell the others to do the same."
Awesome!
I'd already made it to the guild ship to wait to see if the group was going to fill like I had last time. The moment it looked like it was close, I'd buff up a storm and then head in the direction of the raid.
"Okay, I'd like to welcome Khally-ope and her friends to the group, they're new so let's show 'em how it's done," Leader starts in an exciting New Yorky-type accent. I shivered with anticipation. "Is everybody in?"
IN?! As in, inside in the RAID?! NO! At this point, two other thoughts occur to me to heighten my sense of panic. I don't have the quest, and I don't know where it is. I have read almost NOTHING about it and am totally clueless. Clue #2.
Much to my relief, the quest is almost immediately shared by Leader. I sigh gratefully and see that it's located in House Jorasco. I head there as quickly as my un-Strided elven legs will carry me. At this point, Wifey (seated right next to me on another computer) starts whispering frantically "Where is it? Where is it?!" I get to the middle of House J to meet up with the first blue dot I see. It's Clancie, who appears to be looking around frantically in every direction. Then it hits me. There's no directional arrow leading to the quest. At this point I make a judgement call. I could stop and expand my mini-map and see if it comes up or I can ask real quick. In retrospect, I chose wrong. "So sorry, but where is the quest?" Groans from my speakers. I can feel the heat rising up my neck and making my ears burn. "House J" is written six times in party chat. "Yes, I'm in House J," I reply, starting to feel really quite idiotic.
"Okay," Leader sounded a tad defeated. "Can someone exit the quest and let your blue blip show up for 'em?"
Fortunately, someone already had. Clancie, Wifey and I raced toward it. (Although "raced" is probably the wrong word to use for how quickly I run. Doubly so for Clancie who has zero twink gear and wears full plate. Did I have Longstrider spell equipped to at least help myself out? No, I did not. I'd done Spies in the House earlier, so I had Jump, Ram's Might and Barkskin on.)
We all arrive inside the quest after following the accommodating blue blip into the quest. Several people also went so far as to helpfully explain how to find quests on a map. I was starting to feel small. Clue #3.
"Alright," Leader begins in a brisk-but-not-unkind tone. "This is how it's gonna work. Once we get inside, everybody stay right there and don't run off! If you need fire resist, step to the <blah> side, if not, step to the <blah> side." You'll notice I have not included which side was which. I probably *heard* him say which side was which, but at that very moment, something else became FAR MORE PRESSING. I had taken to my keyboard to gush out a "Thanks so much have having us!" When I realised that I had started typing without my cursor in that box, as has happened to me so many times in the past. I promptly began to auto-run...directly into the lava in front of the group. And now I had hit the enter key, so my frantic repetition of the directional "SSS" was dutifully written in my chat box and not determining my direction at all.
I died.
The obscenities spewing from my mouth (or "Irish words," as my mother called them) stopped abruptly as I realised that I was indeed dead in lava, little legs still pumping. My mouth continued to move but no sound came out, much like a fish.
This had NOT just happened in front of the entire group. "Server outage now! NOW. NOW!!" I screamed inside my head.
The groans from my speakers were deafening, accompanied by Leader saying "Uh, Khally-ope...what are you doing?! You're not supposed to swim in it! I told everyone to stay put!!" A couple of people blinked in party chat and others exclaimed in unpleasant surprise. I was oblivious to it all however, as my shame had risen to the point where the grey covering my screen was nowhere near dark enough to hide me.
"Alright, everyone recall out...we'll reform and try it again," Leader said with rising defeat.
And so we did. I release back to the Anvilfire Inn, near to tears, and start rushing back via the airship. My screen freezes while loading the ship. "No. No, no, no!" I whisper and frantically watch Wifey's screen to see if she's been re-accepted into the LFM, which has disbanded. She is accepted without hesitation. When my screen finally unfreezes, I hit the LFM again...and wait. I hang my head. This is not entirely unexpected. At least Wifey will get to-- Oh wait! I'm back in!! Clearly, this is a group with a twisted sense of humor.
I head back into the quest and am greeted with a barrage of helpful advice regarding lava. I am terrified to type anything now, and am FAR to embarrassed to speak out loud, so I merely say "Sorry, hit auto-run accidentally." Needless to say, it doesn't seem to matter much. I am feeling much, much smaller now. Clue #4.
"Alright, there are several ways up the mountain," Leader begins. I can feel my adrenaline beginning to build again. Just shake it off, I tell myself. Just like you did in the Chrono raid, keep up with the group, attack when you see someone else attacking, don't touch anything and keep your mouth shut unless you have something important to say. It'll be great. Just a minor lava hiccup. Leader, with several others chiming in, explains at the speed of light something about how there are different ways to do the beginning. Someone yells out "Don't follow me, I'm going a different way!" The group is Hasted. "Let's GO!" Leader shouts.
Within 10 strides, the entire rest of the group has moved SO fast that they are no longer rendering on my screen. (Game lesson learned: Haste must stack with Striding properties. Wish I had some of those. Noted.) The only character remaining ahead of me is a warforged who is BOOKING. I scurry after him, flinching as a I run through fire elementals. Having died, all of my buffs disappeared and the group didn't rebuff when we entered the quest again...thank you, Reflex saves! The warforged rounds a bend to the right...and runs right over a pool of lava. I balk at the edge for a millisecond and he's gone. I turn around to see who the blue blip immediately behind me is. It's Clancie; bless her heart, she's followed me. Glancing over at Wifey's screen, I can see that she's running frantically (much faster than I can, I might add) but that she too has already lost the people she was following. Her whispers of "Oh no, oh no, oh no" become desperate.
"Where are you?" I whisper to her.
"I don't know!" I can hear the echoes of coming tears in her voice.
I squint at the map and realise that she has rounded a bend to the left where I went right, and has run up some kind of ramp. I grab Clancie's steel-shod arm and race to Wifey's location. I pull open the map and expand it...nothing. Our three blue blips and nothing else. I can feel my own tears finally threatening. I feel a flush of embarrassment about it...for me, adrenaline + embarrassment + estrogen = tear duct usage. I know it's not that way for every girl, but it is sometimes for this girl. I didn't weep or anything and there was no rending of sackcloth, but my eyes definitely stung for a few moments.
"Oh my gahd," comes Leader's frustrated voice. "I *told you guys* to keep up! Awright, would somebody please go back and get them?"
In party chat, someone comments that even when they were new, THEY didn't run around randomly when doing this raid for the first time. A couple of others make similar comments. I'm starting to feel like I should apologise for all of the snarky things I've said about Christina Aguilera in the last few days. Smothered in shame, I say nothing. There is nothing *to* say. Several members of the party are clearly disgusted and are vociferous about it. One drops group. No one blames him, least of all me.
To be fair, a couple of others in the group chimed in with "Hey now, lay off - they're new!" I couldn't hear them over the ringing in my ears, but Wifey has assured me that it did happen.
We follow the group of blue blips through a portal after repeated admonishment from several members of the group to 'keep up this time.' "The map doesn't reflect where you are and it won't show your proximity to others, so if you get lost EVEN A LITTLE BIT, you're screwed!" I can feel the blood draining from my face and the ringing in my ears grows louder.
Fortunately, following the group in the tight confines of the caverns we entered was much easier. Without all of that open space, it seems that they were unable to hit warp speeds. I don't question my good luck, I simply follow, Wifey and Clancie by my side.
What followed made no sense. There was no explanation as to what we were doing, where we were going or why. We raced to a series of chests and got a bunch of loot. We killed what appeared to be very few things, although some members of the group weren't with us, so it's entirely possible that they were doing all of the killing at another location. Several members of the group talked constantly, often telescoping one another, and almost nothing they said made sense to me.
"Now's a good time to put on your water-breathing gear," Leader exclaims as the entire group leaps into a pond. Water breathing gear?! My higher level characters have that, but not this one. I start to panic. Wifey doesn't remember using her water breathing wand on me, but she must have. Only the two of us were remaining beside the water when the blue bubble enclosed my head. We frantically jump in and head towards the last remaining character that has rendered. We follow, grab a chest, and follow back out.
As we're exiting the water, I hear Leader call out "Wait, where's Clancie? Does someone know where Clancie is?!" I feel a white-hot stab of guilt - I had not been paying attention to my friend who was dragged here BY ME. Luckily, someone took pity on her (name of Bhaaam or something like that? Whoever you are, thank you) and went back for her, leading her through to rejoin the group. We gather outside of yet another portal and we all are warned repeatedly to NOT ENTER until somethingsomethingsomething. Awesome. I'd already picked out someone who appeared to know what they were doing, and was determined to not enter until she did. Everyone entered the portal except for her, me, Wifey and Clancie. After waiting a minute or two, she goes through the portal and we follow. There are things left to kill in the room beyond and we participate.
Things continue in this vein for another few minutes. My girls and I follow the group closely, attacking when it seems appropriate. Clancie threw some heals, Wifey threw some Hastes, I threw arrows. We all stop at one of what appeared to be many shrines and Leader asks Clancie if she has FOM. "FOM?" She asks in party chat. Groans. "Freedom of Movement," several are quick to explain. "Not on me," she answers.
"Can you get it?" Leader sounds brusque.
"Sure," Clancie replies after a pregnant pause. I'm relieved to hear pleased-sounding noises from my speakers. Have we finally done something right?
But then the group stops before another portal a minute or two later, and Leader asks Clancie for FOM. The pregnant pause resumes. After what felt like two whole seconds, I hear him mutter "Forget about it," and race through the portal without the buff. Others grumble as well. I feel horrible for Clancie. It was only earlier in the day that the three of us had discussed how to place and use multiple hotbars. Clancie and I had been content with three, but she had reluctantly concluded that she needed five or six and had changed it all around. I realise that this kind of thing is a no-brainer for more experienced players, but we're still getting used to all of that. There was little time to consider the issue, for after a few moments everyone started heading through the portal and we followed.
Before we had all entered, Leader (with others constantly interrupting) had explained in dire terms what the last room would be like. All I could understand was that somehow it was possible to be blown away. (I have an advantage here. I lived in Texas for a few years and am accustomed to the possibility of being blown away.) They debated the merits of wearing Feather Falling items, half saying that it didn't ultimately matter, the other half insisting that we all remove such items. I removed mine. There was mention of a puzzle that had to be solved before the monster could be hurt (I think), but that was it. Then we were through. Someone had obviously already solved it, because Leader was shouting "Alright, let's take him down!" The battle was fierce but brief. Within a matter of seconds, it was all over. I headed over to the two chests and looted them, feeling numb.
Leader thanked everyone and promptly dropped group. About half of the others followed suit before I'd managed to finish typing out my own thanks. Clancie and Wifey also thanked the remaining group members and we finished out. We all stood right outside the quest entrance, surely feeling as stunned as I did. Wifey's face was pale, Clancie was quiet. We recreated a team for just the three of us. Although it was woefully inadequate, I felt compelled to apologise for having suggested that we join the raid.
"The next time I have a bright idea, please ignore me," I say. "I felt so horrible almost the entire way through that I thought I was gonna cry."
Clancie, whose reactions to in-game adversity range from the Shouting Obscenities tactic to the Kill Everything While Shouting Obscenities tactic, surprised me. "It's alright, babe," she said. "We'll try it again some other time and it'll be great."
"That's right," Wifey, who is so shy as to have virtually no reactions at all under any circumstances, chimed in. "We'll read up on the raid and be better prepared next time."
Next time?! Clearly, while I had overestimated my preparedness and skill level for this raid, I dramatically underestimated the perseverance and force of character of my two girls.
In the final analysis, it would be easy for me to rant and rail about how awful a group it was, how unhelpful and unsupportive they were to us new players. After having slept on it however, I don't believe that to be an accurate assessment of them. While I *had* told Leader from the very beginning that we were new and wanted to learn the raid, it clearly wasn't the right group for that. They *were* trying to be helpful at various points along the way, they were simply catering to the majority of the group (as is only right) who were vastly more experienced than we were. In retrospect, it's entirely possible that they went FAR out of their way to keep us safe and alive the entire raid, and we never even noticed. Indeed, when I asked Wifey earlier whether or not she'd used her water breathing wand on me, her response was: "I'm sorry, I really don't remember anything between the lava and the end."
I feel terrible that I may have inadvertently ruined what was otherwise a smooth raid for the more experienced group members, and I hope that they too can look back on the experience with a forgiving mindset. We *will* be better next time and more prepared. I will make a bigger effort to find a group that is appropriate for our skill/experience level, and hopefully the fact that it won't be my very first time doing the raid will mean that my ability to focus will be higher. As Wifey is now pointing out to me, we were hoping that our successes in the quests we'd done would carry over into the raid...and it simply doesn't work that way. Lesson learned. Raids are an entirely different beast and need to be treated with the appropriate caution and respect.
I went to bed last night determined to delete all of my characters from Sarlona and recreate them on LOTRO. Today I feel better. Clancie has already talked to me today about the possibility of a future Chrono raid; Wifey is making me a cup of tea. (I type this knowing she is reading over my shoulder and might be inspired to go actually make tea.) The game is great fun, my girls are amazing... Today's challenge is to recapture the joy we felt yesterday afternoon after questing.
*straps on the new Chaosgarde*
Shouldn't be a problem. :)