Missed Credits & Personal Updates.

I had forgotten to add the credits to two people who helped us get me and Visit get CoP completion. They went out of thier way after I did some /shouts when we were short by two people. Their names are Nikola and Shawnakitty, two mithras; a rdm and war.

Thank you so much you two!! We really appreciate your assistance :)!!

The 6 (Rusty not pictured) Bandinos!!

It was such a good fight yet I felt so bad for Shannakitty. She died more times than me :-P! Nonetheless everyone did a swell job with the set up we had that evening.


Visit and I will be doing our last CS for CoP today hopefully. We didnt get a chance to that evening we toasted Promathia 'cause it was 4am and I was super tired.

Speaking of which Visit has been busy on his alt character, Foulei. I'm proud of him but envious that he has been now leveling Red Mage :).

(Foulei now at 62 *prior to his lvl here we were doing the RDM hat quest for him, shown here*)

Also, more good news! I got my warrior relic body from Dynamis Xarcabard! Yay! It looks smexy I think, tho I get teased because of the "blueberry" look and a few fellow Warrior players want to sclap me 'cause I obtained it. Hehe.
Seriously though, I hope they get thier relic body peices too. Its not a true reward that I got this untill they get thiers too.

(Warrior's Lorica: now 4/6 Relic Completion)

Not much else has been going on since all this other than farming and meriting for the time being. Limbus runs have been starting to drain me dry of gil so I have to keep up with my gil intake. I'll be happy when I have enough ABCs (ancient beast coins) to obtain the Brutal Earring, which I heard is pretty good. Then after a few runs I'll take a short break from Limbus, I think, to build up more gil for my synthing of cooking, woodworking, and alchemy down the road.

We'll see how things go this month with the holidays looming in the air.

-Rusty.

I'm back.

(thf full af, amoung many progress' made in the last few months. more on that later)


Hello.

My biggest and sincere apologies for not updating my postings as I should. But unfortunately just a week after my last post my grandmother had passed away and I needed some time away from the internet, let alone Final Fantasy XI.

It was a rough road for a while. Still, there are days where I miss my grandma' but I'm sure she would want me and the rest of the family to continue with our lives. I will do just that.

My heartfelt thanks goes to my friends, both online and offline, who have been very supportive and understanding. The biggest thanks goes out to my partner, Foulei/Visit. He stuck with me every step of the way and had put up with my depression for the longest time up till now.


I did start back up with FFXI just about a month after my grandmother's passing. The group I was with to finish up CoP continued forward when I did make it back. After much trials and tribulations and LOTS of frustration, we all managed to finish CoP as of this month! Wow, 6 months of CoP whereas overall it took me about 4 years to get the commitment down and going through 4 static groups.
My thing with CoP; well, it was fun and I'd do it again if I had to start from sqare one with people who want to have a good time with it despite some of the mission difficulties. The downside to winning CoP came at a not-so-great price; two friends of mine who were a part of the static stopped being friends.

I wont say whom, out of respect for both of them since they are my friends. There have been some issues between them along with some drama with the other LS we're all with. A lot of tension had been mounting up to the point now where they don't speak to each other. I did my best to try to get them to talk and work out thier diffenences but alas, no go. It was thier choice not to. Granted, I'm dissapointed this happened, but it happened. And if they don't want to iron out thier problems with each other, it is what it is. Maybe it was meant to be.

So while me and the gang did beat CoP, I can't help but feel a bit....empty about achieving this victory. Best thing to do right now is just continue on with the game and have fun with Foulei and my friends.

The Missing Galka, found!

Just got in from work. Busy as always, hot today too. Monday's static run continued, with ony 5 of us since our 6th couldn't make it in time. We did rather well; not too surprisingly since we had a good number of DDs. Pretty much everyone reached level 60 except for me :(. Its ok because they were cool with it and nothing like a good few sessions of Campaign Battles will get me a couple of K's worth of exp to lvl 59, on top of which I can skill up both sword and marksmanship, provided I don't participate via use of allied tags. It does beat going all over the place to skill up and trying to participate in Campagin Battles.
(Fraggles: DL, Visit, Rusty, Meatsheald)

I managed to get a hold of Meatsheald about his aformeantioned leaving the game and the Fraggles Linkshell. Good news is he's not quitting the game. Bad news is he was kicked out of the Fraggles LS!! The reasons are unknown right now but I will get to the bottom of this. It does upset me and Visit that he's been kicked out without giving reason considering we've asked other members about it and either they don't know or some aren't being straight with us about it, considering Meatsheald is a good friend. On the brighter side, at least he didn't quit the game entirely.

Well, I'm off to go do some minor housework before I log on for CoP night. Ciao!

CoP Update. Relic Hands. And More.

July is near its end. I can't believe it. Time does sure fly :-/; what can you do.

At least some effort was put into time this month. I'll start with the status of the CoP Linkshell known as helm (pictured, various helm members).

We've been progressing a little better the past few weeks. Mission 4/2-4/3 are out of the way at this point, with most people now on The 3 Pahts, Mission 5-3. There are a couple of people still on 5-2, Promy-Vhazl. Despite last Tuesday's and Saturday's win/lose we had fun.

(left to right, drunkenscratch, ikaru, rusty, charine)


(Kamille Couch ftw!!)


(lol drg-dress, brought to you by puflgr hehe)


(disaster struck!! dead body slumber party :-P)

Last sunday was to spend time with the social/events ls I'm with, LightBrigade. I've been needing to do so since my time with them has been somewhat limited and I want to spend more time doing things with them but I can't for now untill CoP is completed. I'm very greatful that they are patient with me on this matter. So, last sunday was rank mission day for the LS. The goal: get people through Rank Mission 5/1, beating up a skelie Mega Boss.

(pays respects to co-leader of the ls, Mysticmoon)

Meeting up with Mysticmoon and the others, we came up with a plan to do repeated runs once we arrived at Fei'yin. What was really interesting was the plan Tetheas, our friendly neighboorhood Elvaan, had an idea for a few of our members who only had thier primary jobs at around lvl 25-26, a first time ever in my experience that we've been able to pull this plan off for them. We basically had them go in, stay back from the battle while the rest of us took down the skelie boss. Easy peasy^^. Its not everyday u get a good linkshell that looks out for their own like this.

(Congratulations to those who completed rank mission 5/1!!)

All in all I can say I've been having fun this month :) Next month will pose a challenge however. Between my two friends, Joe and Dana having their first child, Josh and Martha getting married and John thats leaving to attend college in New Mexico, Foulei/Visit and I will be busy along with in-game stuff I'd wager. Speaking of Foulei he's at a dilema and needs everybody's input. He's having trouble deciding on what job he wants to level next. He has a voting poll on his blog here.

Please vote, it would greatly be appreciated!

That's all for today now, but before I go I almost forgot something. I obtained Warrior's Mufflers last friday during the Dynamis-Jeuno run!

(Warrior Mufflers, Obtained!!)

It was a good run. Unfortunately not great by one reason; Meatsheald, a Galka Red Mage and Summoner of the Fraggles, has left the Linkshell, probably the game indefinately :(. I did not find this out until after the run was over when I asked about him. He never gave any warning about it to me so I was shocked if anything because he never really gave a solid reason. I don't think he wanted to only for the sole fact maybe he didn't want anyone to convince him to stay. Who knows really. All I know is that I, along with other people, will miss him greatly.....but also wish him the best of luck, if he has quit entirely.

Meatsheald, I'll make you proud when I level Red Mage!!! Peace Galka :)

"Big League Gear". Why the $%^& stress over it.

I will cut to the chase now in regards to this post's title since I have good news to address afterwards. In all my days since playing this game at the start of 5yrs now, I can never fanthom why some people overly obess over gear that is difficult to obtain. Maybe its because me and other people have a different perspective about gear compared to other people. And people really shouldnt worry about what other people have. If you want something you gotta do what you have to do to obtain it. And one cant let obstacles stop oneself from obtaining it either.

I was talking with a galkan friend of mine, Coalheart, in regards to this a while back while doing a Campaign Battle together (pictured on the left in the upper picture). He simply said "If i can get it i'll shoot for it, if not, big deal, I've been wanting to get the Noble's Tunic for quite sometime, but you know what.....given my timeframe to play and the time it takes to obtain it through farming I just dont really care for it at all right now. Besides there's other stuff out there for gear anyways I can shoot for later."

You know I wish sometimes people who are all gear-crazy would take Coal's advice. Its bad enough this game tests real life friendships and relationships. I don't really blame the game itself, but the players behind it. Yes, it gets discouraging when a person is trying their hardest to get something but at the same time that can't be an excuse to get so bent up and emotional over it, and to a game no less! Really, people need to chill out about it! It's not worth stressing out and getting emo, let alone having your friends and loved ones outside the game scratch their heads wondering why you, the player, are so mad you want to throw your console or tv out the window.

:sigh: I swear sometimes I wish I made a MMO Consulting and Couseling Podcast lol.


Rant Mode Off:

Ok, now i feel better. This topic has been on my mind for the last few days and I needed to vent. There are other things, other news to go on about right now anyways.

First thing's first. On saturday the CoP static didn't do so hot with the Promyvion-Vhazl run. Many people were late, which really couldn't be helped since half the group is on a different time zone than the other half. A misunderstanding, assuringly speaking. What messed us up really was the boss fight. Both our teams, Party 1 and 2 (i was with party1) were so close to winning but we had some setbacks and lost entirely. At least the tough part is over; getting through the floors and beating the NMs while doing so. So tonight we're going to try it again but we dont have to go through all the floors now :)

No Monday static went down i'm afraid so my Thief job didn't progress with the group. Our Red Mage's husband was in the hospital all this past weekend so her and her daughter, our mithran Samurai couldn't get on. Totally understandable. Rwen, Ryabiele, I hope everything is ok with your husband/father. All i did was just level my cooking untill it was time for me to do assault runs for Foulei's character.

(Rusty the thieving scourge of Bastok, hehe)

Well I'm off to go eat, shower then hop onto the world of Vana'diel to try and finish the CoP mission of Promy-Vhazl.

Wish us luck!!

Many news, many adventures.

Hello again!

My apologies for the really late post from the last one I had made. There has been a lot going on both on FFXI and offline.

I do bring some good news in regards to all of this.

After much deliberation and thought I had decided to step down from the Sky/HNM/Sea linkshell known as Legends of Ramuh. Between Dynamis with the Fraggles Linkshell, helping my friend Foulei/Visit out, attending the monday night static with my Thief job and time with the Light Brigade LS along with LoR I wasn't effectively getting anywhere like I wanted to. Also I felt I wasn't much help in the events that Legends of Ramuh in the prior months because most of the events were Sea related, which I don't have access to yet anyways because of non-CoP (chains of promathia) completion.

It was rather counter productive of the linkshell leader to attempt to remove me from the LS, not knowing the full knowledge of my situation let alone consulting me. I had found this out from a few friends of mine who are also on the ls. I took it in stride and informed the ls of my choice to step down. I do not harbor any grudges with the group as a whole and the ls leader is ok, but just needs to improve on his social skills a little bit more.

The choice I made to leave has made a positive impact.

~Level 75!!!!~

After almost 5 long years its finally done! My warrior is now level 75!! Yes, it's taken me this long I admit *haha* but you know what, I'm just happy I "got to the top". However it was not without help and companionship.

Visit, a long-time friend who has been playing as long as I have as made it as well with his now 2nd level 75 Summoner, White Mage being his first respectively. A big congratulations and thanks to him!! I really dont think I could've done it without him and his company. He's worked very hard with Summoner that I'm surprised he hasn't posted a guide for other people. He's really good and skillful at the job, more than he himself realizes. I'm proud that he stuck with it; its one of the most hardworking jobs to level with but the benefits really pays off.
Thanks also goes to members of Light Brigade who came out and leveled/merited with us as well :)
-Visit hits 75 with Summoner!

(left to right; Visit, Rusty, Railo *Kimaru & Solinus not pictured unfortunately*)

(A few Light Brigade Members; Buffa & Pandasoulja)

More good news; members from the dynamis ls I'm with, Fraggle Force, has banded together to do CoP missions about a month ago. Since then we've accomplished so much, with a little effort and trial/error of course. First step was figuring out what mission everyone was on, then work from the bottom up. Needless to say most of us were at Chapter/mission 4, with only a couple of stragglers needing the Mammet fight prior, Chapter 3 respectively.

Before this, I spent a good long 4 months trying to get help for mission 4/2, the Ouryu fight. I either couldn't get help or the fight became difficult due to a number of factors. That became a big 180 when I joined up with the gang from Fraggles. Firstly I was surprised a lot of people had not finished CoP like I have. Secondly half of, I'd say, 25 people were on that fight as well. We sucessfully completed that run with 3 BLMs, 1 Pld, a DD (damage dealer) and a Whm or whatever healer we could find (rdm, etc). We stuck together and took our time doing it without any frustration. From that point on I have full confidence we'll get CoP done, together, as a group, and have fun doing it in the process.

So far, we're all right past Mission 4/3, onto Chapter 5, which we'll start this Saturday. What fate befalls us? Will answers be answered or questions lead to more questions in the Chains of Promathia storyline. We won't know untill we venture foward.

-A statue of sorts, found in inner rooms of Sacarium.

Hot day, in more ways than one~!

(right, during one of my early leveling days with the paladin job)

Today is hot, very hot as I'm writing this. It's 100 degrees!! Sheesh!!

Work, as usual, was ok, not great but ok. Thankfully it was quick today. It's one of the perks to the job I do in when time goes quickly.

Also, today is a hot day for ffxi players such as myself; the long-awaited June Update. And boy, there's tones of info, check it out here !!

First introductions.

Hello. Rusty here! Nice to meet you all here if you're reading this. I've decided to make a little blogspot here for mainly my character on FFxi, Rustytiger. While I'll still continue to make postings on myffxi.net I felt i'd do it more frequently here, no apparent reason.

This blog page is still in the works of being completed to whatever design I'll give it so expect numerous changes though everything else such as my postings and images will remain intact. I'm still getting used to blogspot's publishing system :-P

That's all for now. See you again soon!

-Rusty.