Recently, after hitting the temporary level cap of 60 and getting stuck in the Temple of Uggalipeh, I decided it was time to focus my efforts on what is, or at least used to be, an important part of character development for a level 50-60 character. I decided it was time to try in earnest to obtain my Paladin's Artifact Armor.
I had some time ago obtained the Honor Sword, which is the Artifact Weapon for the Paladin. In fact, it reminds me of an amusing story.
A few months ago, after beating the Shadow Lord and exploring most of the original game areas, I had been frustrated that I had not been able to find anything about Artifact Equipment without a guide. I succumbed to temptation and looked up the Records of Eminence objective for the first Warrior Artifact Equipment quest. It said to start it by talking to a certain NPC in a certain area--and I suddenly realized that I had already completed a quest from that NPC before defeating the Shadow Lord that had rewarded me with a powerful Warrior-exclusive weapon. In other words, I had gotten the Warrior Artifact Weapon and didn't even know it! Well, upon realizing that, I looked up the NPC for the Paladin weapon and realized I already had the quest, so I completed it as well.
The same NPC who gave me the quest for the Honor Sword, after getting the sword, gave me another quest, which I correctly assumed was for another piece of Artifact Equipment. I had made an effort to complete it, but got stumped, and decided to return to it later. Once I hit 60 and got stumped elsewhere, I decided it would be a good time to return to this effort.
The quest involves finding a giant shell bug in the Crawler's Nest. I wasn't sure if it was a random enemy drop or if there was something I had to trigger in the dungeon, or if possibly I had to find something in a treasure coffer (I had thought I had read something in passing about Artifact Equipment and Treasure Coffers). After what I thought was a thorough search for triggers, I decided to hunt some beetles in the dungeon (the only enemy with a shell) to see if they would drop the giant shell bug, or at least a treasure coffer. I had learned recently that the Trust NPC Nanaa Mihgo had the ability Treasure Hunter, which would increase my drop rate, so I was more primed to check this.
Well, after many dead beetles and nothing but gil from a treasure coffer, I decided to see if there was something I could do with numerous baskets where an inspection yielded the message "It looks like something was placed here recently." The baskets appeared to be baskets of rolanberries, so I went and bought some rolanberries and tried to place them at each basket. I'm sure I was on the right track for something, as the game gave slightly different messages for each basket (the fact that there was a message at all means that it was the right thing to try for some sort of result) but I did not learn what the result was supposed to be. It's probably for some other quest I haven't triggered yet.
However, while running back and forth between the areas, I happened upon a crevice in a wall with a ??? target that I had failed to notice before. Upon inspecting it, a Notorious Monster appeared, and I knew I had found what I was looking for. After a short fight, the monster fell, and I shouted in triumph (startling my wife who was doing something nearby) as the monster dropped the giant shell bug.
I thought that would be the end of it, but the quest ended up being much more involved than I thought. Rather than getting my reward for giving the bug to the quest-giver, which would follow the pattern of quests I had done in the past, he told me he had changed his mind about going after the fish that the bug was bait for, and encouraged me to go as well. He told me the general location to fish for it, Castle Oztroja, and I went off to look for a place to fish there.
Just finding the location ended up taking much longer than I expected. It's pretty deep in, and it had literally been years since I had explored the dungeon in detail. But I finally found a shallow pond and started fishing. As I hoped, a Notorious Monster caught the line. But all I got for beating him was...him. I got a fish, which was the dead monster.
I took it back to the quest-giver, hoping I'd finally done it. However, he sent me to Selbina to have it cleaned. In Selbina, the guy at the fishing guild found a pair of knight's boots inside. I took those back to the quest-giver, who didn't do more than remark. But when I spoke to the quest-giver's father, he directed me to take them to the prince. The prince, after noting who they had belonged to, finally rewarded me with the Gallant Boots, my first piece of Artifact Armor, and immediately gave me a new quest.
The new quest was nearly as involved and at least as challenging. I'll spare all the details, but at the end of it I was rewarded with the body piece of my gear (Gallant something, but I forgot the name). Both pieces of gear were quite a step up above what I had been using, and I was beginning to feel quite powerful.
I didn't get any further quests, and couldn't figure out how to trigger another one. I still remembered seeing something about treasure coffers in the past, so I decided to look for coffers in some of the dungeons. Since I was still trying to figure out how to access an area in Batallia Downs, and believed solving a puzzle in Eldieme Necropolis held the key, I decided to start there. It was somewhat fortunate that I did. I found a treasure coffer that had a pair of gauntlets in it--just a key item, not something I could wear, but enough to get me excited. At first I thought it was related to my Artifact Gear, but didn't know what do with it. Then, I remembered I actually had a quest from elsewhere that was about gauntlets in this dungeon, and my hopes drained for it being Artifact related. But then I remembered again that this was a quest I had been given recently, in fact since starting my Artifact Armor quests, and that there had been no apparent reason that this NPC had suddenly given me a new quest when he had done no such thing previously. Sure enough, when I followed the trail, I was rewarded with another piece of my set.
I decided to go to Garlaige Citadel, where I had another unsolved quest, which I hoped could be related. On the minus side, I did not solve that quest or get any nearer solving it. On the plus side, I did find another piece of my gear in the treasure coffer there. There was no quest to solve; it was just a piece of gear.
I wasn't sure whether to search for another quest or another coffer somewhere. When I was bored at work, I decided to review the recently completed gauntlet quest online. The website I used actually stated that there were three pieces of equipment tied to that quest; that two treasure coffers would yield Artifact Equipment once this quest was activated. Curious about it, I read elsewhere a contrary statement that once the first Artifact Armor quest was begun for any given job, two pieces of Artifact Armor would be available in specific treasure coffers, and the gauntlet quest would become available from the same NPC for each job. I read which coffer had my remaining gear, and realized it was the logical next place to check anyway, and went and completed the set.
Now, as I walk around with my gallant gear, I feel decked out, and up to meet new challenges. Like an old friend from high school used to say, I feel like "I am a true Paladin!"
Wednesday, March 30, 2016
Thursday, March 10, 2016
My Epic Battle with the Shadow Lord
Well, I've finally finished my summary of my recent gaming activity. It's time to start this thing in earnest.
The subject of this entry is going to be the most enjoyable experience in gaming I've had since starting the blog: my victory over the Shadow Lord in Final Fantasy XI.
It was a bit of a challenge easing back into Final Fantasy XI. Although on the surface the game looks the same, the experience bears little resemblance to the game experience I had twelve years ago. Low level players and low rank players are very rare, and leveling up is so quick and easy that low level players don't stay that way long. Experience parties are a thing of the past. It is rare to encounter other players in any of the game's original areas outside of the cities.
After I had spent a few days getting my bearings back, I went to Jeuno to shout for a party that would accompany me to finish mission 5-1 to Fei' Yin. After a while, I finally got a single response. After a short conversation, he told me about the new Trust system. I had seen the name floating around, but hadn't yet looked into what it was. It turned out to be the answer to all my partying problems. It was a way to form a party composed of Non-Player Characters, guided by their own AI, which would let a player get through areas that were originally meant for partying, without the help of another player. I quickly gathered a few Trust NPC's to help me out, and easily finished the fight at the end of mission 5-1 at the original level cap of 50.
Upon finishing the mission, I was finally given the mission that marked the end of the original, unexpanded game's storyline. I was sent to Castle Zvahl to investigate the seal that had been placed there 20 years earlier in the game's history. Knowing that this mission was originally available when the level cap was still 50, I opted to try it before completing the game's first limit break quest, so that I could experience it at level 50.
It took me nearly a week to explore Castle Zvahl far enough to get to the Throne Room. At level 50, as a warrior without spells like Invisible and Sneak, it is impossible to explore without a party. But with my NPC allies, I was able to push through. Unfortunately, the Playstation 2 suffers serious performance issues in Castle Zvahl, causing battles to lag heavily for much of the dungeon. The enemies are closely packed, and fighting more than two at a time usually resulted in death (or even just two at a time if they both started attacking at the same time). I had to restart the dungeon many times. Fortunately, it is much easier to get to the dungeon than it used to be, due to a new warping system connected to Survival Guides positioned at certain locations (i.e. the entrances to some dungeons, including this one). I usually earned enough gil from the beastmen inside to fund a new warp from the Survival Guide. Once I passed a certain point, it got easier to explore. Although the enemies got harder, and had to be fought one at a time, their density decreased, and the system lag issues disappeared. Also, from that point, it was a mostly linear path to the Throne Room. And just outside there was a Home Point, which, from new game mechanics, I could teleport directly to once I had reached it.
Up until this point I hadn't been sure that this was, in fact, the Shadow Lord mission. I had suspected, wrongly, that the final mission would be the third rank 5 mission, and that this was an intermediate mission building up to that. But the cutscene in the throne room began playing out, the Shadow Lord appeared, my hair stood on end and I got a chill as his true nature was revealed, and the fight began.
Of course, at level 50 with three NPC allies, the fight ended pretty quickly. I don't think I even got a third of his HP removed. I had been aware that in the early history of this game, no full party of player characters had defeated him until after the level cap was raised to 55. So the battle went as expected. I decided now was the time to do the first limit break quest, and I also decided to change my job from Warrior to Paladin and make the latter my new main job. When I got my Paladin to level 50, I tried again, and almost every level thereafter. Of course I did slightly better each time, but still got beaten up to and past level 55.
As I was surviving longer I began to notice that the boss was consistently winning with around the same HP level, despite a few level-ups on my part. Where I had mostly been focusing on my actions and his HP, I began to pay more attention to the actual fight. I suddenly began to realize that there was a point in the fight where he had begun to be immune to physical damage, and his HP stopped going down. It was an alarming realization, and I began to question whether I would beat him before level 60, as I had hoped I would. I decided to look up the boss online to find out whether I had any options to fight him in earnest without leveling up considerably more.
I learned that once his HP drops to a certain point, he begins to alternate between immunity to physical damage and immunity to magic, depending on his stance and whether he is using physical attacks or magic. He would alternate from one to the other once he had taken enough damage. I realized that for several tries I had consistently been fighting through a magic immunity stage without even realizing it, before being stumped by the physical immunity.
I was initially somewhat dismayed. The problem is, before rank 6, the only Trust NPC that does magic damage at all is Adelheid, whom I was using in my party, but he was always out of MP by the time I got to this stage. And as a Paladin I had little hope of dealing the magic damage myself.
Then I finally found it, on only one website out of several describing how to fight this boss: even if you don't do enough damage, the boss will switch between physical and magic immunity on his own after about five minutes! Once I read that, I resolved on a new strategy.
By this time, I was a level 58 Paladin. I went into battle summoning Kupipi, a white mage, Tenzen, a samurai, and Adelheid (I read he's a scholar, but I don't think I've ever partied with a PC scholar, so I didn't know his class until I read it more recently).
I had decided to handle my magic consumption differently. Instead of trying to save Kupipi's magic by curing myself, I conserved my own MP and let Kupipi keep me at full health. The battle was going well, and I held out clear to the point of difficulty when the boss raised his sword and stopped taking damage. By that point, both my magic users were out of MP, but I was at full health and MP. Then I did something I had never tried in any battle. I disengaged from the fight, and started using my magic to keep myself alive and keep the boss attacking only me.
The plan worked better than I expected. Since my NPC's weren't fighting or being attacked, they behaved as if resting. So their MP began to regenerate. I was losing nothing, since neither they nor I could do anything useful while engaged in battle. All I needed to do was stay alive for about five minutes. If I could stay alive long enough for Kupipi to recover enough MP, I figured I had a chance.
At level 58, as a Paladin, equipped with the Iron Musketeer's armor set available from the Bastok conquest guards, the damage the Shadow Lord does is somewhat manageable. As long as I had MP to spare, I could keep my HP up. As I recall, I could get away with using Cure II for awhile to conserve MP before needing to do a stronger Cure here and there. I could take a beating for a good amount of time.
One of my favorite parts of the fight, though I ended up not executing it as well as it should have been, was using Invincible and then proceeding to start resting to recover my own MP. It lasts long enough to recover a little bit, but I fumbled a bit and didn't get very much from it. But it was awesome to watch the Shadow Lord hitting me for 0 damage for a while as my whole party was recovering.
I had wanted to blog sooner, and in the time that's passed some of the details have faded. At some point I ran low on MP, but Kupipi had recovered hers, so I reengaged to allow Kupipi to start healing me again. I think it was very near this time that the Shadow Lord finally sheathed his sword and started taking physical damage again. I was ecstatic to see it, realizing that my strategy worked and I had a fighting chance. But my thrill was shorter-lived than I had hoped--when the boss had just a few slivers left on his HP bar, his sword went up again.
At first I was dismayed, but I wondered if between me and Adelheid we could get those last few slivers. I threw off a Holy spell, but when his bar didn't seem to move after that I decided it might be more prudent to use my MP to try lasting out another five minutes. I didn't have Invincible available, but my party was in decent shape, so I went for it.
One strategy I used that seemed to work well was to run lengthwise back and forth across the room. I didn't take damage while running; it was only when I stopped to turn around that the boss would get a few hits on me. It helped me to last longer.
Again, some of the specifics are fuzzy, but I think it went something like this. Because I didn't have full MP at the start of the second round, I couldn't last as long. When I was in danger, I had to reengage to let Kupipi heal me, and when he started running low again, I had to disengage again. At some point, I believe it was around here, I noticed that I had lost hate, and the boss was attacking my allies, alternating between them. If I remember right, I decided to take advantage of it by resting myself for a short while. I believe he started attacking Tenzen, which allowed both me and Kupipi to heal. I know that by the time his sword came down, all four of us were at less than half HP, though I was healed back to full almost immediately after reengaging.
As it turned out, I probably would have been better off to use Holy and Banish instead of waiting the second five minutes. He went down almost immediately after lowering his sword. I don't think he took much more than 200 damage before going down. Oh, well.
Of course, as I had previously read, like many a Final Fantasy final boss, the Shadow Lord has more than one incarnation to fight. I watched the cut scene and braced myself for the next portion. Seeing how battered my party was at that moment, and knowing second-form boss fights are usually at least as tough as the first form, I wasn't really expecting to survive, though I was hoping to gain insight into tactics I could use.
When the fight started, it went by so quickly I hardly knew what had happened. I led off with the weaponskill "The Spirits Within," which, at full TP from tanking the physically immune section, and full HP from NPC healing, dealt a little over a thousand damage. It was about a quarter of his HP bar. I concentrated on healing myself, not really getting much chance to see what was happening. But I swear, every time I looked at my log window, it indicated a skillchain from Tenzen off of himself, or a magic burst from Adelheid. The Shadowlord's HP was going down quickly, I realized, and before I knew it, his HP was gone.
It's hard to describe just how I felt right then. An enormous feeling of rising elation was kept in check only by wondering if that was really all there was to the fight. As I watched the game's final pre-expansion cut scene (which in true Final Fantasy fashion probably made me shed a tear or two for its emotional impact) it became increasingly clear that this was it; I had done it. At some point I let out a cry of triumph, possibly alarming my wife upstairs. It was a moment I had waited for for quite a few years, and it did not disappoint. From what I'd read, I hadn't expected to win the fight before level 60, (though knowing what I learned in the fight, I think I could have done it a level or two earlier). But there it was, the main story "beaten," after nearly twelve years of owning the game and playing it on and off.
For reflection's sake, and because it seemed right, I decided to go back to my home nation without using any warps. I can't remember if I walked all the way or just to San d'Oria, but I'm pretty sure I did not arrive in Bastok by airship. In any case, it was very cathartic to return to my home nation and have rank 6 pronounced upon me. It's a badge I proudly wear in game, and it feels great to me that I finally accomplished it.
The subject of this entry is going to be the most enjoyable experience in gaming I've had since starting the blog: my victory over the Shadow Lord in Final Fantasy XI.
It was a bit of a challenge easing back into Final Fantasy XI. Although on the surface the game looks the same, the experience bears little resemblance to the game experience I had twelve years ago. Low level players and low rank players are very rare, and leveling up is so quick and easy that low level players don't stay that way long. Experience parties are a thing of the past. It is rare to encounter other players in any of the game's original areas outside of the cities.
After I had spent a few days getting my bearings back, I went to Jeuno to shout for a party that would accompany me to finish mission 5-1 to Fei' Yin. After a while, I finally got a single response. After a short conversation, he told me about the new Trust system. I had seen the name floating around, but hadn't yet looked into what it was. It turned out to be the answer to all my partying problems. It was a way to form a party composed of Non-Player Characters, guided by their own AI, which would let a player get through areas that were originally meant for partying, without the help of another player. I quickly gathered a few Trust NPC's to help me out, and easily finished the fight at the end of mission 5-1 at the original level cap of 50.
Upon finishing the mission, I was finally given the mission that marked the end of the original, unexpanded game's storyline. I was sent to Castle Zvahl to investigate the seal that had been placed there 20 years earlier in the game's history. Knowing that this mission was originally available when the level cap was still 50, I opted to try it before completing the game's first limit break quest, so that I could experience it at level 50.
It took me nearly a week to explore Castle Zvahl far enough to get to the Throne Room. At level 50, as a warrior without spells like Invisible and Sneak, it is impossible to explore without a party. But with my NPC allies, I was able to push through. Unfortunately, the Playstation 2 suffers serious performance issues in Castle Zvahl, causing battles to lag heavily for much of the dungeon. The enemies are closely packed, and fighting more than two at a time usually resulted in death (or even just two at a time if they both started attacking at the same time). I had to restart the dungeon many times. Fortunately, it is much easier to get to the dungeon than it used to be, due to a new warping system connected to Survival Guides positioned at certain locations (i.e. the entrances to some dungeons, including this one). I usually earned enough gil from the beastmen inside to fund a new warp from the Survival Guide. Once I passed a certain point, it got easier to explore. Although the enemies got harder, and had to be fought one at a time, their density decreased, and the system lag issues disappeared. Also, from that point, it was a mostly linear path to the Throne Room. And just outside there was a Home Point, which, from new game mechanics, I could teleport directly to once I had reached it.
Up until this point I hadn't been sure that this was, in fact, the Shadow Lord mission. I had suspected, wrongly, that the final mission would be the third rank 5 mission, and that this was an intermediate mission building up to that. But the cutscene in the throne room began playing out, the Shadow Lord appeared, my hair stood on end and I got a chill as his true nature was revealed, and the fight began.
Of course, at level 50 with three NPC allies, the fight ended pretty quickly. I don't think I even got a third of his HP removed. I had been aware that in the early history of this game, no full party of player characters had defeated him until after the level cap was raised to 55. So the battle went as expected. I decided now was the time to do the first limit break quest, and I also decided to change my job from Warrior to Paladin and make the latter my new main job. When I got my Paladin to level 50, I tried again, and almost every level thereafter. Of course I did slightly better each time, but still got beaten up to and past level 55.
As I was surviving longer I began to notice that the boss was consistently winning with around the same HP level, despite a few level-ups on my part. Where I had mostly been focusing on my actions and his HP, I began to pay more attention to the actual fight. I suddenly began to realize that there was a point in the fight where he had begun to be immune to physical damage, and his HP stopped going down. It was an alarming realization, and I began to question whether I would beat him before level 60, as I had hoped I would. I decided to look up the boss online to find out whether I had any options to fight him in earnest without leveling up considerably more.
I learned that once his HP drops to a certain point, he begins to alternate between immunity to physical damage and immunity to magic, depending on his stance and whether he is using physical attacks or magic. He would alternate from one to the other once he had taken enough damage. I realized that for several tries I had consistently been fighting through a magic immunity stage without even realizing it, before being stumped by the physical immunity.
I was initially somewhat dismayed. The problem is, before rank 6, the only Trust NPC that does magic damage at all is Adelheid, whom I was using in my party, but he was always out of MP by the time I got to this stage. And as a Paladin I had little hope of dealing the magic damage myself.
Then I finally found it, on only one website out of several describing how to fight this boss: even if you don't do enough damage, the boss will switch between physical and magic immunity on his own after about five minutes! Once I read that, I resolved on a new strategy.
By this time, I was a level 58 Paladin. I went into battle summoning Kupipi, a white mage, Tenzen, a samurai, and Adelheid (I read he's a scholar, but I don't think I've ever partied with a PC scholar, so I didn't know his class until I read it more recently).
I had decided to handle my magic consumption differently. Instead of trying to save Kupipi's magic by curing myself, I conserved my own MP and let Kupipi keep me at full health. The battle was going well, and I held out clear to the point of difficulty when the boss raised his sword and stopped taking damage. By that point, both my magic users were out of MP, but I was at full health and MP. Then I did something I had never tried in any battle. I disengaged from the fight, and started using my magic to keep myself alive and keep the boss attacking only me.
The plan worked better than I expected. Since my NPC's weren't fighting or being attacked, they behaved as if resting. So their MP began to regenerate. I was losing nothing, since neither they nor I could do anything useful while engaged in battle. All I needed to do was stay alive for about five minutes. If I could stay alive long enough for Kupipi to recover enough MP, I figured I had a chance.
At level 58, as a Paladin, equipped with the Iron Musketeer's armor set available from the Bastok conquest guards, the damage the Shadow Lord does is somewhat manageable. As long as I had MP to spare, I could keep my HP up. As I recall, I could get away with using Cure II for awhile to conserve MP before needing to do a stronger Cure here and there. I could take a beating for a good amount of time.
One of my favorite parts of the fight, though I ended up not executing it as well as it should have been, was using Invincible and then proceeding to start resting to recover my own MP. It lasts long enough to recover a little bit, but I fumbled a bit and didn't get very much from it. But it was awesome to watch the Shadow Lord hitting me for 0 damage for a while as my whole party was recovering.
I had wanted to blog sooner, and in the time that's passed some of the details have faded. At some point I ran low on MP, but Kupipi had recovered hers, so I reengaged to allow Kupipi to start healing me again. I think it was very near this time that the Shadow Lord finally sheathed his sword and started taking physical damage again. I was ecstatic to see it, realizing that my strategy worked and I had a fighting chance. But my thrill was shorter-lived than I had hoped--when the boss had just a few slivers left on his HP bar, his sword went up again.
At first I was dismayed, but I wondered if between me and Adelheid we could get those last few slivers. I threw off a Holy spell, but when his bar didn't seem to move after that I decided it might be more prudent to use my MP to try lasting out another five minutes. I didn't have Invincible available, but my party was in decent shape, so I went for it.
One strategy I used that seemed to work well was to run lengthwise back and forth across the room. I didn't take damage while running; it was only when I stopped to turn around that the boss would get a few hits on me. It helped me to last longer.
Again, some of the specifics are fuzzy, but I think it went something like this. Because I didn't have full MP at the start of the second round, I couldn't last as long. When I was in danger, I had to reengage to let Kupipi heal me, and when he started running low again, I had to disengage again. At some point, I believe it was around here, I noticed that I had lost hate, and the boss was attacking my allies, alternating between them. If I remember right, I decided to take advantage of it by resting myself for a short while. I believe he started attacking Tenzen, which allowed both me and Kupipi to heal. I know that by the time his sword came down, all four of us were at less than half HP, though I was healed back to full almost immediately after reengaging.
As it turned out, I probably would have been better off to use Holy and Banish instead of waiting the second five minutes. He went down almost immediately after lowering his sword. I don't think he took much more than 200 damage before going down. Oh, well.
Of course, as I had previously read, like many a Final Fantasy final boss, the Shadow Lord has more than one incarnation to fight. I watched the cut scene and braced myself for the next portion. Seeing how battered my party was at that moment, and knowing second-form boss fights are usually at least as tough as the first form, I wasn't really expecting to survive, though I was hoping to gain insight into tactics I could use.
When the fight started, it went by so quickly I hardly knew what had happened. I led off with the weaponskill "The Spirits Within," which, at full TP from tanking the physically immune section, and full HP from NPC healing, dealt a little over a thousand damage. It was about a quarter of his HP bar. I concentrated on healing myself, not really getting much chance to see what was happening. But I swear, every time I looked at my log window, it indicated a skillchain from Tenzen off of himself, or a magic burst from Adelheid. The Shadowlord's HP was going down quickly, I realized, and before I knew it, his HP was gone.
It's hard to describe just how I felt right then. An enormous feeling of rising elation was kept in check only by wondering if that was really all there was to the fight. As I watched the game's final pre-expansion cut scene (which in true Final Fantasy fashion probably made me shed a tear or two for its emotional impact) it became increasingly clear that this was it; I had done it. At some point I let out a cry of triumph, possibly alarming my wife upstairs. It was a moment I had waited for for quite a few years, and it did not disappoint. From what I'd read, I hadn't expected to win the fight before level 60, (though knowing what I learned in the fight, I think I could have done it a level or two earlier). But there it was, the main story "beaten," after nearly twelve years of owning the game and playing it on and off.
For reflection's sake, and because it seemed right, I decided to go back to my home nation without using any warps. I can't remember if I walked all the way or just to San d'Oria, but I'm pretty sure I did not arrive in Bastok by airship. In any case, it was very cathartic to return to my home nation and have rank 6 pronounced upon me. It's a badge I proudly wear in game, and it feels great to me that I finally accomplished it.
Wednesday, March 2, 2016
Final Fantasy XI: Online Another World
Well, I had originally intended for the last post to catch me up to present, so I would be writing about current experiences instead of summarizing recent history. But then I started playing Final Fantasy XI, and I haven't really made time for much else leisure-wise until recently.
I guess a little more history is in order. Historically, Final Fantasy is my favorite video game series. I played the original when it was a brand new game on the NES, and in that time period it became my favorite game. It was similar to Dragon Warrior, which till then had possibly been my favorite, but in those days I thought it was better still. (Though in later years, Dragon Warrior has proved to evoke more nostalgia, and I claim it now as my favorite NES game.)
The first sequel to be published in the U.S., then titled Final Fantasy II (though it is actually a port of Final Fantasy IV), is still one of my favorite games of all time, if not my favorite game of all time. I have played it through several times, including the Playstation and Nintendo DS versions. It was the first game I had played that had such a detailed level of storytelling, on par with books I read and movies I watched. The story resonates with me to this day. Several of my favorite Final Fantasy characters are in this game, including but not limited to Cecil Harvey (probably my favorite FF main character), Rydia, and Kain Highwind. My wife actually got me a copy of the Super Famicom version of this, but I've yet to play it through.
The other main contender for my favorite game of all time is Final Fantasy VI, which was originally released in the U.S. as Final Fantasy III. It has the most engaging cast of characters of any Final Fantasy game, or really any game I've played. It has one of the best villains of any game I've played. It has one of the most dramatic plot twists of any game I've ever played. And the game's opera scene is an interactive work of art that I never tire of replaying or rewatching.
In late 2002, between my brothers and I, we owned every main-series Final Fantasy game that had been released to that date in the U.S., which was I - X, excluding II and III. I decided to replay the series, which included a replay of I and IV, followed by a playthrough of V, which had only then recently been released in the U.S. for the first time, followed by replays of VI and VII, then completing for the first time VIII, IX, and X.
I had them all finished by early 2004, at which time I was eagerly awaiting the Playstation 2 release of Final Fantasy XI, the first online game in the series. Although I was leery of the monthly fee associated with the game, I was excited to see how my favorite game series would be treated in an online environment.
I quickly fell in love with the game. At that time, because I got it right at the U.S. console release, there was a large influx of new players, and it was not an issue trying to find a party for just about anything I wanted to try. I really enjoyed the interaction with other people, and the feeling of learning to work together for a common goal. As I've mentioned before, I was also fascinated with the dynamic of interacting with players from Japan. I started as a warrior and took it up to around level 20I with lofty dreams of becoming both a paladin and a summoner. But after a couple of months was when things began to fall apart in my home life. I had a particularly unpleasant experience where I was forced to leave a party waiting for me while I took care of something at home, which ended up, of necessity, taking much longer than expected and which left my party uninformed and very angry with me for quite a long time. It frustrated me so much that I ended up taking a break from the game.
I don't think I really picked it back up again until I had moved out on my own nearly a year later. I don't remember exactly when, but it seems like it was just around the time that the second expansion, Chains of Promathia, was released. It was more difficult to get a party then, and I seemed to run into more people trying to tell me I shouldn't try, so I started doing more solo play as I started to explore higher-than-20-level areas.
I think I had a few periods of on-and-off play for a while, gradually moving my character up to and through the mid-20's. But at some point I decided I could not afford the monthly fee, and put the game on hold.
When my financial situation finally began to get better and I got married, I picked the game up again for a while. My wife worked early morning hours and we retired together rather early, so I would end up also frequently waking up early and playing for some time before I went to work in the morning. This was around 2010 and the game had become quite different than it had been when I had played years before. It was now very difficult to get a traditional experience party; in fact, during this time, I believe, was when they introduced Grounds of Valor tomes that caused people to form large alliances against easy prey monsters to get quick experience bonuses and level up much faster than anything I'd seen before. I didn't enjoy it because I thought that it boosted levels too fast to enjoy seeing how the character was developing, but it was the only common party opportunity I could find. I ended up still mostly playing solo, taking my warrior up all the way to level 50 as I explored the higher level dungeons from the original game and completed the Bastok missions up to rank 5. At that point, the level restriction for mission 5-1 had only recently been removed, but I wanted to try it at level 50 and wanted to look for a party. But after a couple of failed weekends trying to get one, I decided to take what I thought would be a short break while I pursued other interests. But when I was ready to start again, my daughter was born, her medical expenses filled our budget, and after we had cut out all the rest of the fat, there was still no room left for a monthly game subscription.
This last year, we paid off our car and our daughter qualified for Social Security. Our financial situation finally saw some relief. I began to think about taking up the game again, but I was enjoying myself with Dragon Quest, Zelda, and the notion of replaying earlier Final Fantasy titles, and figured there was no rush. That is, until I read something that upset me more than I realized it would. Earlier that year, though I had missed it until over half a year later, Square-Enix had announced that at the end of March 2016, they would be discontinuing the Playstation 2 and XBox 360 versions of Final Fantasy XI, and it would be playable only on PC.
For whatever reason, this announcement filled me with a deep regret and brought me to tears. It reminded me that the game would not be guaranteed to run forever, and I realized that my preferred means of playing would very shortly be gone forever. I had always meant to do much more with the game, but had never been able to make things work in my life. Even though I still did not really want to spend the monthly fee, I realized that I would regret it bitterly if I did not take time to play the game one more time, and at least try to finish the main storyline, before I could no longer play it on my Playstation 2.
And so, after discussing it with my wife, I renewed my subscription around late November (I conveniently and coincidentally made the decision right at the start of a 10-free-day Return to Vana'diel Campaign) and spent much of the following months deeply absorbed in the game. I did finish the original main storyline for Bastok, and played through Windurst and San d'Oria missions up to rank 4 to effectively see all of the game's pre-expansion story. I have also started Rise of the Zilart content, though I'm very early into it. I finally figured out how to unlock the paladin job, and I have adopted it as my main job, and have leveled it to 58, with my warrior job at 52. I also took time to level up my bard and several mage jobs up to around 20, with white mage at 30 for a viable support job. I have enjoyed the experience immensely and will likely write about some experiences. However, my steam on it has finally slowed somewhat, and I believe I may take a break from it when the console versions are shut down at the end of the month.
I guess a little more history is in order. Historically, Final Fantasy is my favorite video game series. I played the original when it was a brand new game on the NES, and in that time period it became my favorite game. It was similar to Dragon Warrior, which till then had possibly been my favorite, but in those days I thought it was better still. (Though in later years, Dragon Warrior has proved to evoke more nostalgia, and I claim it now as my favorite NES game.)
The first sequel to be published in the U.S., then titled Final Fantasy II (though it is actually a port of Final Fantasy IV), is still one of my favorite games of all time, if not my favorite game of all time. I have played it through several times, including the Playstation and Nintendo DS versions. It was the first game I had played that had such a detailed level of storytelling, on par with books I read and movies I watched. The story resonates with me to this day. Several of my favorite Final Fantasy characters are in this game, including but not limited to Cecil Harvey (probably my favorite FF main character), Rydia, and Kain Highwind. My wife actually got me a copy of the Super Famicom version of this, but I've yet to play it through.
The other main contender for my favorite game of all time is Final Fantasy VI, which was originally released in the U.S. as Final Fantasy III. It has the most engaging cast of characters of any Final Fantasy game, or really any game I've played. It has one of the best villains of any game I've played. It has one of the most dramatic plot twists of any game I've ever played. And the game's opera scene is an interactive work of art that I never tire of replaying or rewatching.
In late 2002, between my brothers and I, we owned every main-series Final Fantasy game that had been released to that date in the U.S., which was I - X, excluding II and III. I decided to replay the series, which included a replay of I and IV, followed by a playthrough of V, which had only then recently been released in the U.S. for the first time, followed by replays of VI and VII, then completing for the first time VIII, IX, and X.
I had them all finished by early 2004, at which time I was eagerly awaiting the Playstation 2 release of Final Fantasy XI, the first online game in the series. Although I was leery of the monthly fee associated with the game, I was excited to see how my favorite game series would be treated in an online environment.
I quickly fell in love with the game. At that time, because I got it right at the U.S. console release, there was a large influx of new players, and it was not an issue trying to find a party for just about anything I wanted to try. I really enjoyed the interaction with other people, and the feeling of learning to work together for a common goal. As I've mentioned before, I was also fascinated with the dynamic of interacting with players from Japan. I started as a warrior and took it up to around level 20I with lofty dreams of becoming both a paladin and a summoner. But after a couple of months was when things began to fall apart in my home life. I had a particularly unpleasant experience where I was forced to leave a party waiting for me while I took care of something at home, which ended up, of necessity, taking much longer than expected and which left my party uninformed and very angry with me for quite a long time. It frustrated me so much that I ended up taking a break from the game.
I don't think I really picked it back up again until I had moved out on my own nearly a year later. I don't remember exactly when, but it seems like it was just around the time that the second expansion, Chains of Promathia, was released. It was more difficult to get a party then, and I seemed to run into more people trying to tell me I shouldn't try, so I started doing more solo play as I started to explore higher-than-20-level areas.
I think I had a few periods of on-and-off play for a while, gradually moving my character up to and through the mid-20's. But at some point I decided I could not afford the monthly fee, and put the game on hold.
When my financial situation finally began to get better and I got married, I picked the game up again for a while. My wife worked early morning hours and we retired together rather early, so I would end up also frequently waking up early and playing for some time before I went to work in the morning. This was around 2010 and the game had become quite different than it had been when I had played years before. It was now very difficult to get a traditional experience party; in fact, during this time, I believe, was when they introduced Grounds of Valor tomes that caused people to form large alliances against easy prey monsters to get quick experience bonuses and level up much faster than anything I'd seen before. I didn't enjoy it because I thought that it boosted levels too fast to enjoy seeing how the character was developing, but it was the only common party opportunity I could find. I ended up still mostly playing solo, taking my warrior up all the way to level 50 as I explored the higher level dungeons from the original game and completed the Bastok missions up to rank 5. At that point, the level restriction for mission 5-1 had only recently been removed, but I wanted to try it at level 50 and wanted to look for a party. But after a couple of failed weekends trying to get one, I decided to take what I thought would be a short break while I pursued other interests. But when I was ready to start again, my daughter was born, her medical expenses filled our budget, and after we had cut out all the rest of the fat, there was still no room left for a monthly game subscription.
This last year, we paid off our car and our daughter qualified for Social Security. Our financial situation finally saw some relief. I began to think about taking up the game again, but I was enjoying myself with Dragon Quest, Zelda, and the notion of replaying earlier Final Fantasy titles, and figured there was no rush. That is, until I read something that upset me more than I realized it would. Earlier that year, though I had missed it until over half a year later, Square-Enix had announced that at the end of March 2016, they would be discontinuing the Playstation 2 and XBox 360 versions of Final Fantasy XI, and it would be playable only on PC.
For whatever reason, this announcement filled me with a deep regret and brought me to tears. It reminded me that the game would not be guaranteed to run forever, and I realized that my preferred means of playing would very shortly be gone forever. I had always meant to do much more with the game, but had never been able to make things work in my life. Even though I still did not really want to spend the monthly fee, I realized that I would regret it bitterly if I did not take time to play the game one more time, and at least try to finish the main storyline, before I could no longer play it on my Playstation 2.
And so, after discussing it with my wife, I renewed my subscription around late November (I conveniently and coincidentally made the decision right at the start of a 10-free-day Return to Vana'diel Campaign) and spent much of the following months deeply absorbed in the game. I did finish the original main storyline for Bastok, and played through Windurst and San d'Oria missions up to rank 4 to effectively see all of the game's pre-expansion story. I have also started Rise of the Zilart content, though I'm very early into it. I finally figured out how to unlock the paladin job, and I have adopted it as my main job, and have leveled it to 58, with my warrior job at 52. I also took time to level up my bard and several mage jobs up to around 20, with white mage at 30 for a viable support job. I have enjoyed the experience immensely and will likely write about some experiences. However, my steam on it has finally slowed somewhat, and I believe I may take a break from it when the console versions are shut down at the end of the month.
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