2008-04-09 Fatal Fracture

The below post was waiting for Philly when she logged on for the Tuesday night Grunt Foundation run.

From Huld: "Folks, I don't want to go into a lot of details, but due to real life issues wherein I'm voluntarily limiting my time spent in World of Warcraft, I won't be able to continue with the Grunt Foundation. I've had a lot of fun, and I'm sorry that I've been flakey at times. This in no way reflects on you (you being Kon and Philly); the times we've run around together have always been fun. I was asked to pass on for Arq as well that he will be giving up his spot in the GF also, and asked that I let you guys know that he's had a great time and hopes things work out if you decide to continue the characters."

Philly penned the following as she waited for Kon, who probably has not seen this post yet.

From Philly: "I had a lot of fun with you guys, that's for sure. We made quite a lot of progress in a relatively short time considering that we only played twice a week. Gotta love four manning SM Cathedral!

Hope your situation works out for you, Huld. I'm sure you are doing what's best and that of course is the most important thing. Best of luck to you and to Arq as well. My only regret is that I can't make you green with envy by riding circles around you two on Philly's new Skeletal Horse!

Just joking, of course. I'll miss you both. Again, good luck in whatever you do."

As for our little experiment, it may be that those of us in our situation are just not going to have the time to play even on a limited basis like this. I'll talk it over with Kon when he comes on and we'll see what we want to do. For some reason the movie "The Wild Bunch" comes to mind. It was fun while it lasted, though. "

I wrote the below account of our sunday GF run yesterday, before knowing the above. The only thing I changed was adding the comment after the title. The GF is no more.

Scarlet Monastery Again - The Last Hurrah for the Grunt Foundation

Part 2 of sunday's GF run - After a short discussion the four of us agreed that the morning's task would be the Scarlet Monastery once again. This time we were headed into the Cathedral, the toughest wing of SM. We didn't bother to look for a 5th, agreeing without saying a word that we would do it with four.

The Cathedral is one big pile of trash mobs with three Bosses at it's end. Mobs are scattered throughout the open ground areas, fill corridors, and are tucked away in every corner of the place. Groups were generally pulled in packs of three, so Arq and Huld would tank one each and Kon would have his succubus Seduce the third. Some of these mobs had an AoE attack that hit everyone in range for considerable damage, and Philly used Prayer of Mending (PoM) many times this fight. PoM heals everyone in the raid at once. It's costly to cast, but great when everyone is taking damage. We learned the hard way that at least kon and Philly could stand far enough away not to get hit by that AoE. An overpull with two of those AoE mobs caused the only full wipe we had on the trash.

It just took a lot of time to finally get all of the trash mobs cleared. Our first Boss target, High Inquisitor Fairbanks, had to be quaking in his boots. He hides in the Chapel, and can only be accessed by pulling a secret lever in the form of a torch. Some interesting lore about him, as he witnessed Mograine's son kill his High Lord father in cold blood, with his father's own sword no less, the famous Ashbringer. Not so interesting was the fight, which we easily won, or the loot, which was a "green" pair of leather bracers. Kon won the greed roll, and he said it for all of us: Leather - Yuk!

The main event for SM Cathedral is the battle with Scarlet Commander Mograine (the son) and High Inquisitor Whitemane, the fanatical priestess who runs the Monastery. Every mob in the area has to be dead, or they will join in the defense of Mograine when the fight starts.

Mograine stands alone. We engage. It's a relatively short fight and Mograine falls. Upon his death a chamber behind Morgraine opens and Whitemane engages. The fight is going well when she Sleeps Philly, cutting off the healing. Philly looks around helplessly and realizes that everyone else has been Slept and well. As we watch Whitemane resurrects Mograine and brings him back to full health before the spell wears off. Now we have to fight them both together.

Philly picked up the healing as damage was focused on bringing down Whitemane. Once she finally fell Mograine followed her shortly afterward (for the 2nd time).

Mail Leggings dropped from Mograine that the pally, Arq, won. Whitemane dropped [Whitemane's Chapeau], an oh so nice helmet. Philly won the roll over Kon.

Philly, Kon, and Huld had also finished the last major quest in SM - but Arq still needed to run the Armory and kill Herod. So we headed over to the Armory and just blew through it in about 30 minutes. Herod also dropped the Leggings, so Huld got a pair as well. A trash mob dropped the [Tabard of the Scarlet Monestary], a rare item that, well, doesn't do anything, but is kind of cool.

So another dungeon has now fallen. It has taken a lot longer to wrap up SM than it has any previous dungeon. Where will we go from here?

Philly knew where she was headed. In the short term, anyway. To Brill, the tiny town ouside the Undercity where Philly "grew up." There is a Stables there, and riding trainers, and lovely, lovely Undead Skeletal Horses. A lot of work went into earning that 85 gold, but it was very easy for Philly to turn it over, and then walk out of the Stables leading her new mount. Hi Ho, Giddyup!

PS - Philly and Kon decided to keep our tuesday and sunday game days and see how things go. We'll see if we can get others to join us. The two of us had our own adventures tuesday night which I'll get to in another post.

So we will continue. It won't be without a certain amount of sadness, though. I had such high hopes for this group.