Trial 1039, Dynamis Run Jacking, Stuff.

Trial 1039

I knocked a huge chunk out of Trial 1039 yesterday. Started the day needing 898 more Geirskoguls on Amorphs and ended the day needing only 240ish more. The primary reason for the surge is that I finally relented and took a mule down there to two box. Normally I just leave the mules in the Hazhalm area cause it's such a pain to get them back out there at times, especially when I'm running late by my standards.

While I'm glad that I'm about done with this trial, the next one I'm dreading will take far longer. The primary targets I'm considering for Trial 1040 are Bugards in Vunkerl Inlet, Raptors in Uleguerand Range or some Lizards in Cape Teriggan (can't remember what they actually /check). With Geirskogul's damage range being kind of random, it's going to be a little on the difficult side gauging when to use it to try to kill a bad guy, much less 1500 times.

Should have 1039 done tonight and with any luck...1040 done by 2011...

Dynamis Run Jacking

Part of me understands when our run gets jacked by a JP group that doesn't use the Dynamis Calendar. I don't like it, but short of getting up early to break a glass on the zone to delay the group, it's pretty difficult to actually communicate effectively enough to prevent it from happening. For a 2 month stretch late last year, we had an issue with a group led by Aatst called DynamisBunpai or something to that effect. The first time it happened, we just changed runs. The next week when it happened again, we tried to communicate with them about it, but were ignored. This was something that continued the next couple times it happened. Finally, I just got pissed off and started breaking glasses, which got their attention and we haven't had an issue with them since.

For the most part, Odin's NA Dynamis scheduling seems to get along fine. Aside from me f***ing up and scheduling a start time later than it should have been that caused us to bump LB from a Tav run and a random JP shout group that delayed a San d'Oria run by an hour, we haven't had any issues. At least until yesterday...

I'm down killing leeches when I caught wind of BBQDynamis gathering for Dynamis Tavnazia. Our run leader pointed out the calendar and Namicat's response was "I know, we'll try to hurry" or something to that effect. Naturally, our reaction was to try to hurry everyone down there to preserve our time slot, but that didn't happen and the obviously rushed-together BBQ group got into the zone before us about a half hour before we were scheduled to start.

My understanding of the conversation that took place afterward between Namicat and the run leaders led me to believe he knew what was posted on the Dynamis Calendar and didn't give a shit. A quick look at the calendar itself showed BBQDynamis scheduled for their customary time slot in Dynamis-Valkurm and our runs in their correct slots.

Nothing we can do about the run jacking aside from prepare our crew for when we could potentially enter now. So I started going over what to look for in order to determine how long they were going to be in there. The extensions in Tav look like this:

Start: 15 minutes
Nightmare Bugard: 15 minutes
Nightmare Antlion: 30 minutes
First floor ???: 30 minutes
Second floor ???: 30 minutes.

There's a grand total of two hours in there and you pretty much have to start moving the second you enter. I explained that the main thing to look for was their subjobs. While it's relatively common to get the first two extensions before completing the subjob requirements, it's safe to say a group isn't going to make it very far if they don't get their subjobs unlocked ASAP. So worst case is, we push our run back by 1.5 hours at most. Best case is...they don't get any extensions at all and pop back out 15 minutes after they enter. Most likely case was failing to get past an hour, which made us 30 minutes late.

They entered with 12 people. This was something else that worked out in our favor as a good portion of the stuff in there is kind of slow to take down even with 18. After about 10 minutes, their numbers grew to 14.

...then dropped to 10.

...then grew to 14.

...then dropped to 10.

...then grew to 15.

~50 minutes into their run and they still did not have their subjobs unlocked. Our group also observed a number of people that either HP'd or warped out presumably due to a wipe or 4. If I had to guess, I'd say the Nightmare Worm had it's way with them via Draw-In and some Nightmare Bees spawning from a nearby door right on top of them. We've all been there at one point in our Dynamis Tavnazian lives.

An hour after they started, they popped out in a body pile as expected. I felt this was the best time to point a couple things out to them.

The first being, if you're going to jack someone's run, come up with a better excuse and don't be a douche about it. It's pretty obvious Mr. Namicat that you're aware of the Calendar's existence. If you guys didn't have enough for Valk, then check the damn calendar and find a zone you do have enough for that won't interrupt another shell's schedule. While Obsidian was being bumped by JP groups, we've always respected what any other shell had scheduled, including yours. If you don't want to return the favor, then I truly hope you can cash the checks you're writing.

The second being, if you're going to jack someone's run, then at least succeed and make it worth the time of the people you put in a position they don't necessarily want to be in. Your crew lost God knows how much XP while you tried to rush them in. You would have been better off going to Bastok or Sandy. I'm not saying people don't have issues with Tavnazia, we certainly have, but the fact you rushed them in intentionally trying to jack a run combined with the fact you failed miserably in said run certainly provided us with some comedy. Your crew failed to get subjobs until ~50 INTO the run. Both of our crews had subjobs unlocked within 10 minutes of entering.

Amazing what a little preparation can do...

...also amazing what Karma can do.

It speaks volumes when members of BBQ that don't do Dynamis with that group talk about it's poor organization and compare it to the arm of AIG that lost billions in the financial collapse.

At any rate, I suppose it's our move next...

Might be time to revisit the old EU Run Setup and have a Tavnazia around midday Wednesday...

VNMs

Spent most of Saturday evening running our crew through the various T2 VNMs along the different paths. Lamprey Lord and the two Fairies are some serious bastards if you try to tank them straight up. The rest of 'em were relatively easy to take down.

My biggest issue with VNMs at the moment is we either have too many people there or we don't have the right job combination for what's been proven effective against them.

Scheduling

Up until this point, we've tried to get at least one event per week in. It's pretty obvious now what our strong attendance times are and where we have most of the interest, but for some of the more mundane stuff like farming in general, it's getting kind of irritating having low numbers show. Our group is small enough to where if someone is a little patient, they'll basically get leftovers for minimal effort or cost. I've never been a huge proponent of making everyone pass items and essentially destroying them, but there's part of me that thinks we should consider doing this on the bigger ticket items. Or at least forcing everyone to lot/pass stuff instead of letting it auto-distribute.

Overall, I'm still relatively happy with turn out, but as with any shell expanding into areas like we have, it's still a learning process. Aside from the item distribution, I think we still have issues with perception and communication about "official" events. It's kind of a general belief that when the new website is done and running, this will be fixed.

Summer "Get Together" 2010

This year's Get Together will be from July 15th-July 19th at King Cranky's abode in West Virginia. The currently RSVP'd list of people include Kay, Suraph, Lectrikelion, Kreoss, Kaelis, Erimentha, Yoteo and myself with invites sent to a few other people like Mexibishe, Cuban, Kimille etc. Due to space limitations, we're probably not going to have more than 10 people there unless some don't mind tents/sleeping bags or spooning with other men...

The primary caveat to this year's invite list is:

King Cranky Cat has to like you. He generally likes everyone despite his gruff online appearance. This caveat has actually been present at all of the Get Togethers, but since it's King Cranky, we like to point it out as it's a rather humorous facet of his personality.

General plans at the moment are for everyone to make their travel arrangements to either arrive at the Baltimore Airport on the 15th by 1:00PM or drive up from wherever they live. Then to have their flights home leave from Baltimore Airport no earlier than 5:00PM on the 19th. King Cranky will pick us up from the airport and I'll be renting a car for the haul back to Cranky Caverns. (Anyone that wants to pitch in for the rental fees and whatnot, feel free to...)

Anyway, back to work for now. Slow day here today, so I had some time to do some blogging. Hopefully that trend continues as I have a lot of other stuff to blog about. :)