Last time we came to the Plane of Fire, we scurried back and forth in front of the zone, kiting mobs, a good portion of whom declined to be kited. We muddled through.
Since then, we have been joined by an uber knight, Tarfu, Mantis morphed to his Tribunal enchanter, and, oh yes, mercenaries made themselves available for hire all over Norrath.
No matter who should show, then, we could make a group and go do STUFF.
And STUFF was done tonight.
Though it seems second nature to me now, there was a time when I could not find my way through the Plane of Fire. There’s a wall too high to climb right near the beginning of the zone, and well, it can’t be climbed.
The “easy” way is to get Spirit of Eagle from a (cough) kind ranger, climb to the top of the mountain across the river of lava from the castle, become invisible somehow, then fly (if you were GOOD) entirely over the castle, or (if you were AVERAGE) into the second floor balcony, down the stairs, through the courtyard, and out the other side.
I was on dial up back then with a computer even punier than the one I have now. I dropped way faster than I ran and I just couldn’t make it over.
This was a source of much frustration for me. I used to bribe mages to summon me through. I used to try and get other people to play my character and run me there. But I eventually discovered the hard way, which was:
If you follow that same river of lava, it ends in a POOL of lava. Dive down through there, taking 110 damage every six seconds, and follow the wall (visibility is pretty near zero), hold your breath because breathing lava is BAD, and eventually, as you were on your last gasp and molten rock was giving you a sunburn you’d remember for the rest of your extremely short life, you’d pop out of the pool to find yourself surrounded by fire mephits. Escape them somehow and you could walk through a door and find yourself in the heart of the fortress.
For years, I never knew the thrill and joy of sailing into the fortress. But then I got a new computer and a fast connection and never did it the hard way again.
I was playing around in the tables area, as far as you can go in the Plane of Fire unless you want some quality face time with Fennin Ro himself, waiting for the others, but Tarfu and Elraynel couldn’t get past that honking great wall.
Five years ago, that was me (omg, has it BEEN that long? But I guess it has.) I gated out via Throne of Heroes, ran back, SoE’d them, and showed them how to run into the building. Someone’s invis dropped, so we ended up fighting, and when we found out that Tarfu’s pet weapon dropped in that very spot, stayed there the rest of the night, become very deadly killers of anything with “fire” in its name.
Kanad joined in a little later. He and I both dinged 66 (I’m 39% in), and Tarfu and Eraynel, both level 69 already, made 10 and 9 AAs respectively. No deaths. Well, except at the end, when Tarfu had to suicide out after every gated out around him. Leaving him alone in that awful place.
Normally it wouldn’t have been a big deal, but he was the master looter, so it was kinda in our best interests to help him out. I was about to log my druid in to run there and port him out, but since dying and reviving no longer means a corpse run — all your gear comes with you to your bind point now (and you don’t even need to re-mem your spells!) — he suicided, and I rezzed him after he summoned his naked corpse with a 100% Divine Resurrection I’d been saving just for him, or someone like him.
I used to tell people that Divine Rez was a self-only spell, but turns out it can be cast on others (Shh…).
None of the Spear of Fire-dropping nameds were brave enough to spawn for us, so Tarfu just has to make do with the uber weapons he already has.
I don’t know where we’ll be next week. I kinda am thinking we should at least visit the Planes of Water and Air to complete the set — and the Plane of Water has a couple of group-oriented ring events — but I just have these nagging visions of people drowning.
And of course, Plane of Air is a total death trap. Though if we could clear the zone in quickly enough, there are some single-group nameds that are probably always up. Even when PoP was PoP-ular (sorry), hardly anyone did the nameds. When we cleared it on our way to Xegony, most of the loot just rotted. The only good stuff was so very deep that hardly any group would even bother. It was the most annoying of the elemental planes.
Still, it would be fun to say that we went to them all? And Air does have the most named loot to make up for being so annoying.
Anyway, some 85 was soloing the nameds as we were finishing up. He called out that he had just killed Arch Magus Yozanni, one of the typically annoying Fire bosses (he will suck all mana out of you and everyone within range unless Remove Greater Curse is cast almost immediately, great fun for healers) and had a leather and a plate mold drop. Elemental armor was once the best, but now it still can’t hold a candle to Defiant, which is far FAR cheaper than the cost of the components for elemental armor would be, so we thanked him for his kindness in offering them, then ported out, leaving Tarfu stranded.
See you all next week 🙂 We’re still recruiting, by the way — EverQuest, Luclin Server, any character 55-70 would be a welcome addition!
I’m glad to see you guys are still trucking along and the mercs are working out so well. I did finally get a job so now I can afford to play but don’t have the time =/. I do still enjoy reading about the adventures though!
Always here if you feel the urge. Great news about the job!!!