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It’s tough to be so close to 50 but not actually BE 50. I figured I’d better work on that. Sunday morning I used a combination of roulettes, hunting logs and fates to bridge that gap.
The level 50 quest was suitably wonderful, and goddammit if I didn’t feel like a member of the Sultansword afterward. I can’t imagine how I’ll feel the next time I get a job to 50 – oh wow, looks like I (yawn) saved the world again, and just in time for brunch… The first time means something. I imagine the job quests didn’t always grant both an iLevel 50 and iLevel 90 armor set. I’m grateful that they give newbies like me a little head start, especially since I’m not planning on buying Heavensward just yet. Level 50 is the hard cap for me now.
The first roulette dungeon I got was Garuda. I’d done it twice before; the first time was a struggle, the second fairly smooth with just one wipe. This time, though, everyone knew the fight, and it was a perfect run. First try, everyone survived the Reckoning in fine shape, it was over and done with in minutes. Next roulette was Sastasha, and lastly Stone Vigil. This turned out to be the problematic run. Everyone kept dying in the cannon room. Not sure why. I finally guessed it was because the dps and the healer were all camped out next to the cannons. I suggested they only go up to the cannons when they were shooting Isgebind, and we succeeded after that, though I’m not sure that had anything to do with it.
I finally made level 50 finishing the 3rd level gladiator hunting log.
I had a baby shower to attend, so I couldn’t really explore much. I did add my new spell, Circle of Scorn, to my taunt macro. It’ll be useful for grabbing that initial aggro. I also got an ability that will make me nearly invulnerable for 10 seconds. That might also be useful on large pulls. It has a seven minute cooldown; I’m not sure if I’ll remember to use it very often.
Level 50 opened up a couple of PvP scenarios with my grand company, the Immortal Flames. I also got a new PvP roulette to play with. I signed right up. Half an hour later it popped me into a three-way PvP match between the grand companies of Ul’Dah, Gridania and Limsa. Standard capture and hold scenario. Enemy PCs are labeled only with their class, so you have an instant idea of what they can do. I, as a paladin, was largely ignored or ganged up upon. I had no idea what I was doing, but I did appreciate being stunned and kicked off a plateau to my death. That was a pretty slick move :)
Doing my first PvP got me another title, Flame Puppy. I found I’d also gotten the Flamelady title for earning over 100K company seals, so…. I’m the Heart of the Party no more. Flame Puppy for me.
Omuro, who’d finished the main story quest and started on the hard dungeons, grabbed me for a hard level dungeon, but newbie me couldn’t play those games. He signed us up instead for Dzemael Darkhold. Not really a fan of that dungeon. I fell off a ledge, again, when a toad stomped me. Even though I’d done the dungeon twice before, I barely remembered the encounters, and nobody else in the group seemed to remember the second and third boss fights, either. I kinda had dim memories, and shared them. Second boss, dodge AEs. Third boss, kill the corrupted crystals.
Mostly Omuro just wanted to show me his cool, hard-mode armor. Which was suitably awesome. I defy anyone to prove to me that playing dps is ever hard mode. compared to tanking and healing. I’ve got my Dragoon job into the 30s, with Archer and Pugilist on their way. When I do dungeons or hests as dps, zero stress. If the tank is new, sometimes I can offtank (Dragoon is great for this), but mostly… after the thrill of tanking, merely doing dps – as vital a job as this is – seems a little boring to me.
Tonight’s our story night. I’m looking forward to dealing with the new threat we encountered after defeating Garuda last week!