Bonus Day!

Logged in today in the tired old LGuk. The zone was mostly empty, probably due to the opening of Velious. More people playing their mains over there and more exp zones open means more freedom here in the classic zones! Checked out LFG, and put together a group in short order. Headed over to the frenzy camp, and cleared out some froggies. I was not able to find an enchanter (which was astounding), so I grabbed a paladin to help offtank. This worked pretty well, and though we lacked CC, we were still able to get a good killing pace going. Eventually a group member had to leave, and a chanter was available, so we filled up with some CC. We decided to move to the hamlord camp (hand, arch magus, lord). The killing went pretty well, though we had trouble with root on our pullers and had a few mishaps. Luckily having a paladin turned out be a blessing, and a couple rez spells kept our down time to a minimum. We ended up getting quite a few named, though we didn’t get any of the high ticket loot.

I was playing the main tank and healer at the same time, which proved to be quite a task. However I was complimented by the group on doing a great job, so that made me feel good. At one point I was healing, buffing, pulling, and tanking. Definitely kept me very busy, and not for the faint of heart. Our first pull of the lord went south though, as I tried to FD pull to break the room. Unfortunately, after getting up from FD we still got all of the room on us, and the enchanter died, which unleashed his pet. My shaman and the mage died shortly after.  It was one hell of a battle though. We killed the adds, and thanks to my SK chain tapping, paladin heals (who was afk at the start of the fight), and ranger spot heals we managed to get the lord down to about 25% before my SK went down due to everyone being OOM. At that point the lord went into “runaway” mode, so the remaining ranger and paladin finished him off. Rezzes were passed out and we got back in the action shortly. After a bit more killing, the group broke up due to people having to head out. By then I had hit 40 on my SK though, and 39 on my SHM.

Sword to the noggin

I took this opportunity to head back to town for selling and buying of new spells. At this point I was not going to head back to LGuk, and decided to go to CoM for some new action (finally!). I got a port, headed over without incident, and entered the zone. I sent a few LFG calls out but did not get any bites. I decided to head in and see about doing some duo action while waiting for a group. I had only been to this zone once or twice before in many years past, so I had no idea of any camp spots. I found a good looking corner though, and set up there. I had just finished buffing when an enchanter in the zone asked if I wanted to start a group. I said sure, and the chanter came over. Apparently the spot I thought looked good was actually a camp, the left arena. Lucky guess!

At this point it had been announced that there would be an XP bonus for the weekend, so I was excited to get in on that action. I sent out a request for members in general chat. I was instantly bombarded by about 10 tells responding to the request. First time I had that many people jump at a group offer. I picked out the cream of the crop and got a full group set up. We ended up with a necro, enchanter, SK, Shm, druid, and wizard. Once everyone arrived and we were ready, about 15 minutes before the “go live” time for the exp to turn up, we began to slay.

It was pretty ridiculous how fast we killed mobs. By the time my shaman could get his slow cast, the mobs were already under 40%. I said screw it, since there was no point on slowing mobs that lived for 10 seconds or less, so I focused on spot healing the enchanter when pet broke or when the wizard pulled agro from the face melting she was doing. We had killed about 20 mobs in 5 minutes and I was pretty stoked with the xp rolling in, so I popped exp potions on both characters. Then BAM disconnected on both characters. Phinny down! Not sure what happened, but the server was down for about 20 minutes, either due to a technical error or because it needed a restart for the bonuses to work properly. I got back in as soon as I could, half expecting the group to have wiped. Happily we were all alive and well, and except for the wizard we were all back within 5 minutes. We continued the slaughter, and the wizard returned just as we were starting to look for a new member.

I found out the named here are pretty damn strong (level 49 as I later found out). We had 1 wipe due to a pull of what I thought was a single named when the enchanter was afk. I pretty much have to chain tap and chain heal on my shaman to keep my SK up on some of these bastards. Once we were set up again, we continued on. Got a few other named but I was prepared and we managed to kill them without much trouble.

Gooey!

Chanters seem to like their Boon spells, werewolves all over the place!

Damn bushes are always in the way here

We did end up getting trained twice, which was a bummer because it took a bit to find rezzes, and slowed down the exp by a good bit. However, I was able to ding 40 on my shaman and 41 on my SK in a couple hours, which would probably have been at least 1 level more if we did not have all the down time due to the wipes. Also, another group moved in on the other side of the arena and we had to compete for pulls.

By the end of the group, we had 2 SHM, 1 SK, and 3 NEC. Was a bit of an odd group setup, but the necros charmed some of the undead skeletons and it was facemeltingly fast killing there. I had heard the HP of the zone mobs was pretty low, and from what I saw that was very very true.

I also found out my guild has a few Child’s Tear for MQ, so I am hoping I can get my shaman epic’ed sooner rather than later! If I play my cards right, maybe even before he can get into the planes, which would be very awesome. Will have to see how it plays out.

Monotonous Frogloks

 

Well, I can safely say I am sick of looking at ugly frogs. Have been hanging out in LGuk at various camps. Spent a day at the assassin camp, grinding away on these undead baddies. Squeaked out a few levels on each toon, and have not had too hard a time getting groups. Usually either find the camp open or join up. Even got lucky once and logged in at the camp from the day before, and instantly joined a group there that needed a tank and healer. All in all it has been going pretty smooth, especially with the abundance of enchanters around to cast clarity and keep the CC up!

Aside from killing froggies, I spent about 30 minutes starting up faction work for my shaman epic. Killed ol’ Peg Leg in Butcherblock a few times, and did three turn ins to get going on my True Spirit faction. Going to have to find a kind (or capitalistic) druid to port me over to BB to speed it up. Taking the translocators and running through EFP is both time consuming and nerve wracking. Luckily invis held up on my few runs through though.

Logged in today in the Commonlands, not entirely sure where I wanted to go. I took the opportunity to sell off a bunch of crap from my bags, and threw up LFG. Spent about 20 minutes mass casting divination spells on both my toons to assist in casting invis, since I seem to fizzle about 25% mana trying to get the bastards to cast. Also bought some bat wings from a new player for levitation when I need it.

While I was busy casting away, a cleric in the tunnel asked if I wanted to form a group. I said sure, and before I knew it we were on our way back to LGuk. Wasn’t too thrilled to go back yet again, but I resolved to go father in and get a higher level camp than assassin. We gathered up some other members as we made our way over, and were a full group by the time I zoned in. There were two picks up, and we went into number 2. Found the zone pretty much empty, aside from someone camping Raster. Excellent! We headed down to the Executioner camp, and began the age old slaughter of frogs. The only plus for this zone is I am cutting down on the faction needed for Crown of Deceit, which I plan to quest on both toons when PoP rolls out. Maybe I have a wood elf fetish… I should probably look into that.

After a few hours of pulling and slaying, I moved the group over to the frenzy camp. Figured we could at least try to get some good loot while we were mindlessly killing. It went pretty well, until we had two group replacements come down and I died trying to IVU one of them when I ran into a train with bats in it, among a gang of undead. Was pretty frustrating, since I had to run my SK back all the way from Commonlands. But I trudged it out and we made it back to camp safely on round two.

Deep inside the froglok lair

WRU Frenzied ghoul?!

By the end of the day I had gotten 60% into 39 on my SK, and about 50% into 38 on my SHM. I logged out in the safe room down below. I think my next play session will see me heading over to City of Mist after gathering my next set of spells. The exp is still great down in LGuk, but I am just getting tired of the zone. A little variety would be welcome. Glad to be just about ready to enter my 40’s though!

What’s This Button Do?

Just a quick update tonight. Did a couple exp groups at assassin camp in LGuk, bringing shaman up to 34, SK to 36. Moving right along, though I am going to have to move farther in soon. Getting light blue mobs on some pulls, and lower cons if we pull towards BR. All in all it went well though the first night was a bit shaky… oh and someone over at DBG hit the “launch” button on the next expansion a week early!

The first night we had a paladin in group who was still new, and claimed he solo’ed to level 35 (he was also wearing expensive twink gear – go figure). Had to guide him to the zone and lead him to camp, which wouldn’t have been too bad. It soon became apparent he did not have his keys set up to tab to nearest NPC. As such, he was constantly click corpses, which was clear as he was the MA. Gave him some direction as well as the handy /hidecorpse commands. This seemed to help him out though, and I am not one to belittle anyone who needs to learn.

The only thing that bugged me was after the rest of the group had left. I informed him I was going to camp and head out, but he pulled a group, took a wrong turn, pulled another group, and trained us (just three of us, my shaman box, SK, and him). We all died. Was not very pleasing. I buffed up in CL, and logged off feeling a bit disgruntled.

While checking the forums today, I discovered that through some sort of error, Velious had been launched a week early. I did a little research into the zone levels, just to refresh my memory. When I logged in tonight I did a run to Crystal Caverns, and killed some Ry`gorr orcs on the way for good measure. Mostly was a trip for nostalgia, and so I could claim I charged into Velious on the opening day (forgot to take screenshots). I took the translocator from North Ro to get the full effect, though I guess taking the boat would have been more “original” but I did not want to wait for it.

While there I got an invite to LGuk, and though it was out of my way, I origined and gated back and headed over. Managed to level my SK and get most of the way through level 34 on my shaman. Sadly I am pretty tired tonight, so I couldn’t stay long enough to finish the level on my shaman. But I shall return tomorrow in full force and get back what I missed!

Assassinating the Assassin (And Friends)

 

One of the druid’s new spells, share wolf form. I had a strange urge to knaw on froglok bones…

Started off tonight by logging in to the land of the undead frogs once again. Sent out a LFG request, and contacted a monk I had played with a few days before who was advertising for a LGuk group. We formed up, and I checked the picks to see which would be the best bet. Turned out the non pick version of the zone only had 12 people in it, as opposed to 21 and 24 for the other two that were up. I zoned over and headed to the assassin camp, which we found open. Loving invis vs undead! A chanter and druid who had joined the group met me there, and while waiting for a monk and wizard to arrive, we started to kill us some froggies.

Unfortunately, the monk had not been to Lguk for some time, and got lost on the way. The wizard did not fair well either, and died en route. The monk ended up making it to zone, but pulled some agro from frogs and died at zone in as I was heading there to cast invis vs undead on him. Sadly he decided to log out of frustration, since he had died twice and lost a level. This zone can be pretty unforgiving.

We filled our missing spot and the killing continued, with little mishap. I was actually the puller and MT, which was a bit challenging while running the shaman too. However, setting up some social macros helped a good bit. Backup healing was very important for alpha damage from larger pulls and helping keep the chanter up when his charm broke. The pulling here is kind of a crapshoot. With the way the walls are designed, with the narrow spaces and lack of sight, apparently single pulls usually ended up being 3-4 mobs at a time. It is also easy to lose your orientation, since there are so many twists and turns. The enchanter was keeping very busy tonight!

We had a good killing pace, and I was able to pull all the way to the executioner at one point. Sadly a group moved down there and snagged the named when it repopped. We did get a lot of named though, including supplier, assassin, savant, and scribe. No upgrade drops for me yet, but a nice BP dropped that I considered. I decided against it, opting for losing 5 ac but gaining 10 stamina. Not sure if it was a good choice, but I figure it is pretty much a wash.

The exp here is awesome. In about 2.5 hours, I knocked out two levels on my SK, bringing him to 34 (and 60% into level), and three levels on my shaman, ending at 33. Finally got an HP buff better than inner fire, which was nice. I used origin at the end of the night, as I will need to grab new spells before I head back to grouping. I was quite surprised how fast I made it through the levels, and didn’t buy as far ahead as I should have. I guess that’s not a bad thing though!

The Return to LGuk

First things first today, after logging in I went ahead and gathered up spells for my upcoming levels, as well as snagging a melee augment for my SK. Pretty cool these are in the game, though they are just the basic ones. I know warriors are probably ecstatic about the stun/dd procs, which will make life much easier for them. I added one to my SK 2 hander, just for some extra agro. I don’t have problem on agro thanks to spells, but I figured it would help on those damn stunning basilisks. Stocked up on new spells for my shaman as well, which are getting much more useful as time goes on.

I got a port back to lavastorm, and headed to the basilisk camp. There were already a few people there, so I asked to join up. We started killing away, and the lizard blood began to flow. After about 15 minutes, the group discussed checking out Lguk. I had not yet been there, but was ready to give it a shot. Many hours grinding faction there for the wood elf illusion crown gave me a good idea of the zone layout, even after all these years. Our druid ported us to Commonlands and we all ran over without incident.

We ended up going to the second pick of the zone, where we found the BR (bat room?) camp to be open. Made it there without much hassle, and I finally found a use for my invis vs undead spell. Luckily I had trained divination up a bit, so casting it wasn’t a fizzle fest. The exp was great here, and I was able to hit 30 in no time. The mobs here were surely not as trivial as the basilisk camp, even discounting the multi-pulls. Only issue we had was running out of mobs due to assassin camp pulls.

Nasty spiders!

Here we have the necro in his natural habitat, laying down on the job

Eventually we did a camp check, and found that the exe camp was open. We decided to move down, but an error in judgement led to a froglok led massacre. We headed down and jumped over the bridge before the assassin camp, hoping to kill our way to exe camp in a shorter route. Unfortunately, a charmed mob our enchanter had broke the second we jumped. Thus, we trained ourselves and ended up a pile of corpses.

We headed back and rebuffed at the BR camp. This time we killed our way in, and made it to camp in short order. One of our members even had a 60 rogue box, who helped pull and break the spawns, since by now there was a full pop up all the way to the assassin camp. This was quite helpful, as these mobs are no pushover. They hit pretty hard and without enchanter mezzing, it would get ugly fast. We had my box shaman and another shaman doing our heals, and luckily I dinged on my shaman and loaded up Greater Heal. Happy with this upgrade, though it is mana heavy it is more efficient than regular healing.

Rumors of cheap gastric bypass surgery available in Lower Guk appear to be true

Things went pretty well, and we were able to kill for quite some time. Unfortunately we had a puller new to the zone who took a wrong turn and ended up bringing two high level groups to camp. The healers got agro, since the chanter couldn’t mez them all reliably, and down the group went. Still ended up with more xp than lost though. By this time I had to head out to the bright world of real life, so I found a couple replacements for the group. Grabbed a rez for my shaman at zone in (SK did his old cowardly FD trick once it was clear we would wipe). Ended the day at level 32 on my SK, 30 on my shaman. Not bad, 3 levels a piece plus another 50% into the next levels. Camped at zone in and can hopefully find a group in short order.

Basilisk Blood

Logged in tonight at my favorite spot in Solusek, intent on driving my faction into the negatives. Wasn’t much going in the way of people LFG, so I duo’ed while looking for people to join. After about 30 minutes, a few people showed up and we formed a group of 2 SK, 1 bard, 1 shaman, and 2 enchanters. We decided to head deeper into the cave and camp the bar room. This was my first time really boxing in a group setting, and luckily the other SK started pulling once we figured out the bard was very squishy. Damn near wiped on second pull before the chanters showed up, with my shaman healing the bard, getting agro, and having to chain heal to stay alive. Decided the other SK would pull and tank, while I was MA. Once chanters arrived though, it went well. At least for about 15 minutes.

Where the hell is the bartender!? Goblins have no sense of customer service.

The other SK died on a pull of larger goblins, and we picked up the train. Having 2 enchanters for mez and charm was about the only thing that kept us alive. Topped off the higher level pull with repops, and it got hairy real quick. The SK informed us he had a better spot to try outside SolA in Lavastorm, so we fought out and met him in the north part of the zone. Though the mobs were higher level, they were quick respawning and all we had to do was target and cast to pull them to camp. Dervishes and basalisks were the prey of the night, and the XP was great. One of the chanters went LD, so we replaced him with a wizard when he did not return.

Only problem here was the basalisks have about a 10 second stun proc. At one point I taunted one that had broken free from the chanter’s charm, and was stun locked for 2 minutes before we decided it would not be worth it to charm the bastards. Having 2 tanks available was great though, since either one of us could tank when the stun went off.

Popped some XP potions as well, and though the ZEM was not as high as in SolA, we killed enough with the level difference that the XP was at least as good. Managed 1.5 levels on my SK, bringing him to 27. My shaman got 2 levels out of the deal, and ended up at 25. Camped there for the night, and going to try it again tomorrow. The mobs don’t hit very hard at all, despite being red and yellow cons. Will try to put a group together and keep up the trek to 60!

Your stun is no match for us, slithering lizards!

The Kindness of Strangers

The last few days have been spent destroying the poor goblins of Solusek’s Eye. And I mean massive slaughter, like multiple generations worth of goblins. And what did I do while this was going on? Mostly sit on my proverbial ass.

After my initial excursion, I was excited to go back and get some serious xp flow. Though my sessions were limited to about 2 hours after work, I was hoping the zone wouldn’t be camped at that hour (10:30PM-12:30AM). I was happy to find that was the case upon login. I killed my way in to a safe spot, and sent a LFM message into general to see if I got any bites. I got a response from a kind soul offering a druid for the group. Little did I know what I was in for.

It turned out the druid was actually a box of a 60 enchanter. Quite a nice guy too. He arrived, informed me he was drunk, and that we were going to PL. He was having issues with getting his laptop to work right, but he got it fixed and began to kill. “What could go wrong?” I asked myself. As it turned out, nothing at all! With the enchanter pulling trains, and the druid doing a PBAE, we started a massive goblin eradication crusade. XP was coming in faster than Donald Trump’s late night twitter feed.

It was actually pretty fun, despite me being pretty much useless as far as killing was concerned. He was talking crap to himself on each character, and generally being an amusing oddball. It even wore off on me and I started smack talking my boxed shaman. In retrospect, maybe I am an oddball too. Oh well!

I offered to assist in paying for some of the peridots he was using for rune, but he refused. A genuinely nice guy, he wanted to help out and preferred having someone else in group for banter and general good vibes. We knocked out some levels right away. I informed him I would be back the next day, same time and place. He said he would be too.

The next night, true to his word, he showed up right after I logged in, this time with another person at the same level as me and in the same situation – just happy to be getting an assist from a nice guy, for no reason other than he wanted to help. His buddy he brought along, another SK, was also nice to meet.

This time I kept busy by making some socials and mass casting my low casting skills, since by now I had gotten FD on my SK, and Cannibalize on my shaman. FD turned out to be abjuration, which aside from low level resist buffs there isn’t much that uses that magic skill (and gets used regularly). Since I didn’t plan on fizzling for 15 seconds while hoping FD would cast, I started bringing that skill up to par on my SK right away (the other guy was also an SK, and followed my lead since he also had low skill). My shaman also needed some skills in conjuration for a new DoT. I also realized I could just grab SK spells when my shaman made a spell gathering run, since SK spell vendors are right near the shaman spell vendors in Cab. After another night of goblin genocide, I ended up at 26 with my SK and 23 with my SHM. Moving right along to breaking 30!

The mighty duo, standing over their fallen foes… did not make any goblin friends today!

Filthy Goblins and a Quick Swim

The scourge of the fire goblins pre-gaming at the zone in

I now dub thee Sir Headless

What a pleasant cave. Look, someone is even napping next to the fire…

Minor update today. Only had an hour or so of playtime, but I decided to try out SolA and see what kind of adventures could be had. I snagged a port to Lavastorm and made my way in with my SK and Shaman. There were a couple full groups already inside at other camps, but I was able to pull the 3-4 goblins near the entrance to see what kind of fights and xp I would get. I was very pleasantly surprised to find the XP here was amazing. I ended up duo’ing here for the majority of my play time. Even my 22 SK was getting good xp off the blue cons (and occasional white con), while my shaman had better gains off the yellow and red cons. I did have two incidents occur. My SK snare wore off a goblin who ran at low HP and warped through a wall, disappearing from view. He sent quite a few of his buddies to find me, and my SK ate a death while my shaman made his escape. A quick port back and I was in business again.

Of course, my poor SK then fell into the lava and had to make a hot swim to SolB. When I got into SolB, I prepared to rush the exit, though I only had about 40% hp left (I struggled to find the way out of the lava pit). As I began my hopeless evacuation, I was rooted by a couple Kobolds. I attempted to use my wimpy lifetap to survive until root wore off, but death was near. As I watched my health hit 5%, then dip to 0%, I knew it was over. I waited a few seconds for the death notification, but nothing happened. I was still alive! I turned around wondering what the hell was going on, to find a level 60 Epic’ed Iksar monk standing over the bodies of the Kobolds. I had no idea where he came from, but he miraculously saved my bacon. I thanked him, joking he was my guardian angel. I turned and looked to see if any Kobolds were ahead, turned back around and he was gone. I made a quick dash to the zone line, then headed back to join my shaman at the entrance to SolA. Killed a few more mobs, ending with about a 30% – 40% gain on both toons. Not bad considering it was mostly a scouting expedition. I plan to return and hopefully join a group or get one going.

The Lizard Rises

Not sure if he just pooped or loves taking selfies, but that is one happy lizard

Spent a couple days leveling up my shaman. Stocked up on spells before heading out, originally heading to Befallen for some group action. The zone was surprisingly empty though, so I spent some time killing at the zone in and eeked out a level, bringing me to level 9. While laying low some skeletons, I got an invite to another spot I had not been to before, the South Ro crocs. Since it wasn’t too far of a run, I agreed to check it out. I made my way over and joined a jolly band of ruffians.

The group banter was great. This was the EQ of old that I remembered. Not only did we get some great experience, we made some good friends and had some laughs. This reminded me of the magic of EQ – spending some time with strangers, having a good time, and progressing all at the same time. I know with the current status of live servers in the sub-top game, finding a group like this would probably be a near impossibility. Was a very enjoyable time.

I managed to knock out some more levels, and ended up at level 15 before I knew it. I headed out, grabbed my next set of spells (got them up to level 20), and called it a night.

Logged in again the next day and headed back to Unrest. Found a group on my first /ooc. Although the group lacked the personality of the day before, we still had a jolly time clearing the bottom floor of the mansion. So much so in fact, we were often waiting on repops. I hit level 17 and a tanking spot opened up, so I brought my SK into the group for my first true “boxing” time with my two characters. Since my SK was already level 22, tanking/pulling was pretty much a breeze. Slaughtered for a bit more and hit level 18 on the shaman, while still making 50% through 22 on my SK. Working on getting my socials set up on my shaman for easier spell casting will be essential. Did make a couple for slowing/nuking/healing, but plan to fine tune this as time goes on and I get more useful sets of spells.

Unrest – Zombies, Ghouls and…Beetles?

I made my way to Unrest via a druid port to BB. The run isn’t that bad, which I was a bit concerned with at first. Gotta get used to these old world runs to exp zones! I made it to the zone without incident, simply by following the edge of the map. I do have to be careful about the cliffs, if I simply auto run I will most likely end up entering the zone with half HP, or running into a train and meeting my demise. I found at level 13 I was still in the low end of the spectrum, and there wasn’t much in the way of open group spots. However, after soloing some of the zone in mobs, I was able to piece together a group and camp the gazebo, the lower level camp for the zone. The exp was actually pretty good, despite there being mostly blue con beetles and zombies. The respawn is fast and usually we had a few mobs being killed at once in camp. In an hour or so I hit 15, and we moved into what I found to be called the “MR” or main room camp. I stayed here a solid block of time, slaughtering with a myriad of people. I find that at this point, the camp spots are usually fully taken, with people simply being replaced as time went on. I ended up with a completely different group at the end of the day, having rotated through probably two groups worth of people. I did hit level 20 with about 60% into the level though, so the xp was flowing nicely. I found that it started slowing pretty quickly due to the mob level difference at this point, but we still managed to get a few yellow and red cons. I ended the day a happy camper, and returned to Commonlands via my origin (love being human). Stocked up on a few new gear pieces, and was ready to go again.

I logged in the next day and spent some time starting up a boxed character. I decided to go ahead and give it a go, using my wife’s laptop as my second box. Fits nicely on the desk and I don’t have to hassle with another desktop (though getting used to a second mouse and not hitting my main keyboard is akin to learning to juggle). I started an Iksar shaman, hoping to benefit from the added regen. I jumped over to Emerald Jungle, which I found to have wizards running a taxi service most hours of the day. Scored a port to commons, bound in the tunnel, and loaded up on some gear from my waiting SK.

While this was going on, I put LFG up on my SK just to see if I would get a bite. A cleric I had grouped with the day before invited me over to Mistmoore, which I had not been to for a long time. I decided to let my shaman hang out for a bit and got a port to BB once again, and headed over (LFay is huge!). We camped near the zone in, which was great for me since I don’t know the zone very well. I found that the mob levels were around even with me, but took a huge jump just a little way in at the graveyard area. Spawn times weren’t too bad, and I banged out a couple levels, ending up at 22.It went pretty well while there, though we did get trained twice and only lost one member, who was bound outside the zone. I would like to try the zone farther in when I get a couple more levels, seems like a fun place. Many trains though, from what I am told. After I headed out from MM, I started bringing my shaman up to speed. After grabbing a regen and DS from a guildie, I waltzed into Befallen and began slaying like a madman. After the DS wore off, I brought my SK over and helped by killing mobs once they hit 49% or less, which is surely not as fast as the old DS/Regen trick. However I got the shaman to level 7 in short order. I am probably going to get the shaman to a level that he gets XP with my SK, then group up and try to even out the levels so that we can hit up camps together and keep near the same level. I figure its going to be easier this way, rather than maxing out the SK and trying to level the shaman after the fact. On a side note, I am really happy that they included Origin as an innate AA you get at level 5. Using Origin to gather new spells and gate back to the Commonlands is leaps and bounds better than having to port over and run into town every time I need to stock up. I usually buy the next 5 levels of spells so I can focus on the exp grind as well.