Fearless Ferra's Fascinating Fortunes

I've been sitting here for the past ten minutes, trying to think about how to start to sum up my two and half years of Sword2 Era.  ^.^;  Then I remembered that the first year was already written (here).  Here's my best effort at recapping in shorter summary with time frames.

*This post's F4 title was submitted by my Reckless Elsie, though I don't think my fortunes were fascinating, nor did I have that many fortunes!  XD  My version of F4 is "Ferret Ferrari Freaky Fast".

June 2010 - June 2011
This was my noob year.  The clan I was in had half a dozen people on at any given time and it was very quiet.  I made some friends through selling TA starters.  It was a year of doing Pioneering Quests and Character Quests and getting 84e gears.  My brother helped me do Garcia's quest, fighting Novia because I was too scared to do it.  She was very difficult to take on at the time.  I had just gotten fresh Experts and borrowed some 92e gears.  I hadn't even done Holy Water Chamber (Novia scared the crap out of me and I was not ready to take on Ortega and Jurgen until I felt I was better geared).  On June 26th, I ended up using Flavia on Crusader, Katia on Outrage, and of course Nadia for ET.  It was the first time I felt the heart pounding adrenaline of completing a difficult mission.

July 2011 - December 2011
I joined Core Clan while I was halfway across the globe visiting relatives.  During this half year, I was jobless and spent the majority of the time playing the game (though I'd much rather been making money to pay bills; it wasn't for a lack of trying to secure employment, the economy was really bad).  Being in this clan helped me to boost up my gears.  Clan raids gave me symbols I needed.  ELB recipes were firecrackered to members.  There was even money for attending Clan Wars (which I still dislike attending - I died more than I was of any use).  I made a crazy goal of getting all twenty-one Trump weapons, which I either bought or crafted.  I still sold TA and Circus starters and any money leftover from Trump purchases, I set aside for a pretty costume or two.  I also crafted my first (and only) Constellation weapon (Lightening Bracelet) on December 26.

It was also a time of getting the new batch of characters, who at the time were Torsche, Valleria, Reckless, Raven, and Lionel.  On August 25th, I took Flavia, Katia, and Orphelia (Cathy STR) to take on Torsche.  This wasn't as bad and I even managed to do this with 92e gears (no ELB or 100e at the time).  The next day I decided to attempt Valleria.  Even to this day, her quest is still the most difficult thing I've ever done.  Flavia was on Peltast and Geia was on Level 12 Sect of Moonlight.  This one I had to borrow gears, and even with ELB and ESA and Constellation weapons, the quest ended with four minutes left on the clock, wrist aching, fingers straining, heart pounding, blood rushing from brain too fast -omgdidIreallyfinishthismission?!?!- feeling.  I finally got Raven October 6th, Reckless October 20th (I didn't have a Master Martial Artist for the longest time), and Lionel December 30th (he cost me seven Ele Jewels to go to Clock Tower seven times because the other squad kept screwing me over on Floor 7 quest drop; they didn't stop DPS'ing).

January 2012 - December 2012
This year I had less time to play than ever before.  I started my job and it requires me to travel from time to time (hence those "Hiatus" posts).  On the weeknights I have just enough time and energy to do three dailies.  Sometimes my weekends were blocked up studying for exam (four part examinations for certification related to my job).  I constantly have to remind myself not to get frustrated when I feel like I'm behind everyone else in the clan.  There is only so much I can do with the limited amount of time I have.

I started the year with a month in Albatros with Alzeda and VantzmartS.  Alba was too pro for me.  I wasn't around to attend the raids they went to (they tended to raid super late at night for me) [raid time is an issue with any clan, it's hard to find a time when everyone can attend].  I ended up joining Halcyon, just barely meeting their requirements (how I managed to stay in the clan is a mystery to me, because everyone in the clan has at least five times the gears I have and better; I admit I don't like to look at Clan Chat because people linking their gears end up making me feel like crap).

I never thought I'd finish my Tower of Chaos questline (ELNrs and GCrs are still elusive to me).  Or even attend raids in Lucifer Laboratory/Basement.  I wish I had more time to participate with the clan, but timing is difficult.  I have the most fun with my clan on Sundays when I'm around to do Clan Raids with them.  There aren't a lot of things we need from the Clan Raids, but for me, it's the most likely time I'm able to spend with them and it's still a fun quick thing to do.  Good friends and reliable clannies were made from the clan.

Despite the short amount of time I have to play, I've accomplished more than I could have ever imagined.  I learned to triple WC (still needs work, but I am able to do it).  I can do Prison, solo CM, solo BH Occulta, solo BH Sedecram (things I didn't bother to do before because I wasn't capable).  I vesped (FrankenFerret™) a lot (never did this before).  I leveled all my characters to Expert and finished their Expert Stances.  I crafted all but three 100e weapons (I guess this was the weapon goal of 2012).  I started working on Accessories (belts, gloves, shoes, necklaces).  I received a lot of help from friends and especially Senpai.

I departed Sword2 standing alone on a patch of grass by the Fountain in Reboldeaux, but I left it full of memories.

January 2013 - Onward
There will be a lot of work to be done this year, as we are going to be jumping several patches.  Unfortunately for me, January 9th to 11th, I'll only be able to play a bit in the evenings.  Then from 12th to 14th I'm traveling again.  After that it will pretty much be the same as before, short hours of play on the weeknights and squeezing as much as I can on the weekends.  I expect by the 19th, when I actually have my first weekend, half the server will have half the new characters in their Quarters already.  And I'll once again be left behind eating people's dust.  :p  (Have to remind myself again, there is only so much I can do.)

There will be new missions to learn.  Missions to be added to dailies (or weekendies?).  Character quests to be done (very slowly for me).  Because of the timing of this first week, at best, I'll start Katia and Etienne on Unlimited Shot and Stella (ETS) on ET.  Then Mercurcio and Casandria on Telekinesis and Tania and Darien on Wanted Shot.

As for the server, Castilla?  I'll be on the same time zone.  Though there was only ever three game timers that I attended.  1) El Pat/Faction Fight, which I heard is going away.  2) Medusa which was horribly Wednesday midnight, so I seldom made it, will become 9PM (assuming timer stays the same).  3) Alliance War (Legion War/Battlefield) which was Saturday 7PM will be 4PM (though this one never really caused conflict for me).

Clan Lucifer raids is kind of up in the air to me right now.  Because there will be several strong clans, they'll all want a bite of Cortes.  In Orpesia we had a three way agreement where we rotated the bosses.  I haven't been up on what's to come of this.

How do I feel about the merger?  It's a mixed feeling.  I'm excited, but scared.  On the one hand, it'll be nice to meet new people and see my three friends from Illier.  On the other, with three former servers merging, the competition just got even more competitive.  There's going to be a lot of strong people.  I consider myself as someone who keeps low key, out of sight.  I think I'm going to be hiding in my ferret corner, a lot.  I don't want to get PK'd while I'm AFK'ing, so I don't plan to get in anyone's way or rub people wrong.  I'm a squishy ferret with no PVP gear.  :x

Rest assured, there will continue to be posts about this family's trials and errors.  I wager I'll be stumbling a lot for the next few months until I get the hang of things.  ^.^;

See you soon, Castillians!

~~~~~
Some end of year things I put in list format under the cut.

Things I didn't craft:
*Second ET ring (I think I need more Rhodolites)
*Third Crafted Necklace
*Second Constellation Weapon

Things I didn't get:
*50 Black Magic Stones (for Veronif)
*300 Dragonfly Silk (for Tora)
*Cut Ice RES Necklace
*Elite Le Blanc Scout
*Magic Leather Gloves recipe
*Magic Gauntlets recipe
*Magic Earring recipe
*Artisan's Earring recipe
*Incantation or Invulnerable ring

Things I did get:
*Some more 92e Barons from raid roulettes and kind donations from Senpai and Snowy
[In need of: Destruction of Steel (Greatsword), Grim Reaper (Polearm), Mallet (Polearm), Mucerati Warhammer (Polearm), Bandersnatch (Sabre), Gladius (Sword), and Battle Crossbow]

Unfinished quests:
*Burlon Village - Adelina Extended Quest (leads to Lisa Extended Quest)
*Alejandro Extended Quest

Number of +7 gears I own:
*9 Weapons
*3 Armors

Weapons with high racials:
*99% Life Crossbow (V)
*96% Life Dagger (E)
*89% Undead Crossbow (F)
*85% Undead Dagger (E)
*97% Daemon/91% Golem LOE (V)
*93% Daemon Pistol (V)
*96% Human Lightening Bracer (V)
*96% Human Pistol (E)
*87% Golem Blunt (not that I use this) (F)
*3AR LOE (E)
*83% Golem Crystal Shooter
*80-some% racial Resonance of Steel (forgot to screencap)