So close. . . yet so far

WHM62/BLM31

BLM is nearly 37, got all my AF except gloves, killing Maat is the only genkai left, mostly past all the expensive spells. . . need 2 more pieces of gear before I've got mostly the best stuff I can get. . . I can smell 75. Of course the crappy part there is, what about sky? I haven't even really started any zilart missions at all. Due to the fact that I'm getting to the upper levels so quickly I dunno how I'm going to manage getting into the end-game stuff without doing a lot of waiting. Having said that, I am aware that it takes a long time to get through the levels I'm at now to get to 75, as they're quite long, so perhaps I'll end up having plenty of time for sky after all.

Also I'm still only rank 5. . . . which is bothering me, but I might manage 6 soon, and once I get 6, 7 should be easy.

Money has also been an issue lately though. . . . the AH has been raping me, and I haven't had a chance to do a BCNM recently. I need to spend like. . . 400k or so, and right now I've got roughly 75k, so I've got a ways to go and little to no day-to-day income.

Oh well, I'll figure something out.

What. The. Fuck.

This evening, I had the good fortune to have a great friend (Encino) be in the middle of helping a group of friends with someone's WHM AF3 when I logged on, and they were willing to let me join. So, we went over to eldieme after I helped Encino get 72 BLM back using the chocobo race thing, and we get to the hume bones and start killing dark stalkers. After a while, the bell for me drops, I lot, and wait. And wait. And wait. Then, not thinking about what was up with the bell, Encino and I disband from our part of the alliance and join the main group for escape. We escape, they go to do the shadowlord fight, and I warp to whitegate. I check my inventory. No bell. I check my key items, cause I figured it might be that and I was just having weird false memories. No bell. The stupid bitch WHM who the group was mainly doing the run for never fucking passed. Just to make it clear she was a fucking moron, she was wearing the earring that is activated by WHM sub, the AF hat (it was fairly clear this was what she wore in exp), and had no dark staff at 57. Oh, and shes rank 3. I pity anyone who parties with her.

Words can not describe how much I want to strangle this stupid selfish bitch. Normally, this wouldn't piss me off as much as it did, but I know damn well that there isn't going to be any kind of raid from my linkshell to help me get this probably within the next month, and I'm probably going to be 75 by then. Additionally, if I had the AF body, I'd wear it in exp and I could sell my crow jupon and mule my seer's tunic. I need the money from the crow jupon to update other pieces of gear.

Saying much more would likely result in me spewing out profanities and wishes that this stupid WHM would suffer some misfortune. . . like de-leveling to level 4. . . fuck that'd be satisfying. At any rate, I'm done, beyond still feeling like I need to kill her.

Weekend!

So, its early friday afternoon, got back from Japanese class a little while ago. Its pretty fun, learning lots of stuff, just getting the alphabet down now. As far as FFXI goes. . . lets see. Finished G3, the last hard one for me. Got 58 WHM, so I can almost equip all the AF (most of which I don't have yet, go figure). Going on a raid with the linkshell in about an hour and a half for RDM/WHM/THF AF3s (not my WHM AF3, a friend's), and hopefully a Beadeaux coffer key for the same friend as the WHM AF3. At the moment I'm partying with Encino's SAM, my BLM, and some random WHM/BLU (I'm convinced that if they weren't here, exp wouldn't suck) in Qufim, but we're making like. . . I dunno 200 an hour or less. At any rate, thats it for now, hopefully I'll party WHM later tonight, and maybe I'll update this later with how successful the raid was.

More progress

Well, first thing I really did today was get some friends together to help me get my Crawlers' Nest coffer key. At first, it was just me and Encino, but after a while we gave up, and later in the day, we got back together with Bloodless and Dungeonwhipper, and the four of us went back, and got the key on the third Helm Beetle we killed. After that, I ran around, found the coffer, popped it, and found a little something special inside.


Now, mind you, when I popped it and got my pants (freaking finally, I HATE my RSE leg piece now. . . been wearing it since 31), I was only level 55 still, so I couldn't wear them. So, right after that, all four of us went over to Beadeaux to try and get Encino's coffer key for his PLD AF legs. While we were slaughtering Quadav, I got level 56 (I had used my dragon chronicles from this week's chocobo race on my WHM to bring me within 200 of 56 earlier, so it was quite easy).


So, now I'm 4 levels away from needing to level my sub, 4 away from needing G3 done (going to work on that tommorow perhaps), and a mere 19 levels from 75. Also it seems like the cost of spells seriously tapers off after Raise II (which I still need to buy/farm ><), so I'm looking forward to cheap gear and such. At any rate, its time to sleep, I have class at 10 AM tommorow (yay for early morning Japanese).

How the eff am I doing this?

Alright, yesterdays post was really long, so heres a nice short one that gets straight to the point.

Um. . . I'm not going to complain, but what the crap?

Well, last night I was level 50. Was just hoping to be able to use my dark and light staves. At the end of last night I was level 52 and halfway through to 53. Now, I'm 53, and quite close to 54. So, now I need Genkai 2, my AF from the Garlaige Citadel coffer (head piece), Raise II soon, and my BLM leveled a bit (its 30 at the moment) sooner than I'd anticipated. If this continues, I think I'm going to just take WHM to 75 before touching much of anything else unless its in a static. That way I figure I'll be able to take whatever I want straight to 75 without being constrained by level caps, particularly the Maat fight (which is stupidly easy with WHM if you didn't know), and I'll be able to merit junk if I feel like it. Furthermore I'll be able to do end game stuff with all my old friends, get Hexa Strike, Black Halo, and if I can convince people to help me, Reverend Mail (I think thats what its called). Actually, after writing all that, I think I've convinced myself that I want to take WHM to 75 now. It'd also just be nice to get it out of the way, and have a job at 75 to take care of things that my other jobs can't. The only thing I'm really worried about is making money, and I've got clothcraft at 22 to help with that, but it just hasn't been enough. I've been farming on my THF but thats been taking a while too with not much to show for the time I've put into it. On the other hand, I should be doing some BCNMs soon with Draconum and either Dungeonwhipper or Galbatorix, so that might make life much much easier as far as gil goes.

Of course, since I got 52, I can wear the WHM AF boots, which Draconum helped me pick up earlier today.






Overall this isn't a horribly amazing piece of gear (except for soloing, its veeeeery sexy for soloing), but its a lot better than the seer's boots I was wearing, so I'm not going to complain. The MP boost is certainly nice for the slot.

Next up is my AF hat at 54, but I think I'm going to wait on getting it because I'm just going to be wearing my gold hairpin in exp anyways. I'd be all for getting it if it didn't likely mean I'd have to get Draconum (who pretty much ends up going on every single raid for anything the link ever does) to come and do the majority of it, so I'd much rather wait on it until no one else really needs anything and Draco has had a bit of a break from helping everyone, or until I can get someone other than Draco to help me out.

And now because I'm bored, have some random screenshots.

Just me, Draconum, Dungeonwhipper, and Galbatorix killing Ahtu for Draco's key.


This is how you leave Fort Ghelsba in style. Draco was power leveling my MNK to 12 so I could duo with his RNG, and once we finished, this is how we left.

Ding!

50 WHM! Freaking finally. The last two days, I was seeking for about 6 hours total, at level 49 with about 2k until 50, and I got nothing. Not even idiotic RMTs trying to invite me. Today though, I got a craptacular party, which disbanded pretty quick (NIN lost hate to 1 Cure II, WAR was a douche for lack of a better way to put it, and the RDM never refreshed anyone, lotted on things, and was afk 90% of the time), and was then invited to a really nice party that quickly got me 50 and then some. Of course, I've already knocked off G1, so right now I'm just seeking and waiting to get 51 so I can use my shiny new staves (picked up dark and light a few days back). I've also leveled a number of other things, and I'm too lazy to look at my older posts to see exactly how far I've progressed, so here they are:



I've also run into a lot of old friends in Coejus' linkshell (such as Coejus), which has been quite fun.

As far as what I'd like to do in FFXI right now. . . . hmm. White Mage to 51 is my immediate short term goal, then hopefully to 60 relatively quickly, along with maybe SAM going up a bit too, but I dunno if I really feel like dealing with the dunes again on a melee job just yet, so thats holding me back a little. Now that I think about it, I'm almost back into the mood to take Bard up some more, maybe to 40 or so. . . I'll probably do that after WHM hits 60 unless I get frustrated in the 50s.

Oh well, back to seeking. . . hopefully I'll manage 51 tonight, that'd make me quite happy. . . really want to equip those staves. . .

Variety

Well, I tried to level WHM a bunch after I did that run to 30 with my BLM, and it just fell apart. I got a party that wasn't. . . . well they weren't exactly the best level 42-44s out there. That kinda disheartened me a bit, so I'm currently working on my Bard, which is 18 (would be higher but I had another hockey game last night and I'm headed out with friends today, so I'm not partying) and should be 30 within a couple days. My only worry is getting my hands on a scroll of Mage's Ballad. . . I could easily buy one, I've got the money sitting there, but I just wouldn't feel right buying it when I could quest it and not have to deal with buying and then selling another copy later once I quest it. Oh, I also got Mary's Horn. I was randomly farming and I ran across Stray Mary, completely untouched, so I killed her and got my horn, was quite a nice surprise after I threw up three times playing hockey that evening.

For the moment, I've decided that the jobs I'm going to be "actively" leveling for a while will be BRD, MNK (WAR sub), WAR (THF/PLD sub), and BLM with a touch of PLD sprinkled in because my linkshell needs another tank, currently the only one is the leader, so he has to do like. . . well. . . everything.

Of course, most of the leveling will revolve around Bard. . . I love the class, my sub job is completely leveled already, and its incredibly fast to level, so admittedly I'm going to be spending a hell of a lot more time on it than on the other 4 jobs that I'm currently looking to level.

BLM Debauchery

Well, I've been trying to more or less just put my head down and level like mad with my BLM. Guess what? 2 days, 7 or 8 levels. I think I accomplished my goal. Its been a fun and interesting ride. One party, I had another BLM in it, hume if I remember correctly, and he was using his highest damage spells while I used Aero and Fire repeatedly (Yuhtunga Mandragora's in Yuhtunga Jungle), which made me laugh, cause I was out-damaging him significantly and I usually had more MP than him. So, at the time, I figured I was a great BLM. Then I had another party, later on, with another BLM, this time a taru. As the party starts, I notice that he is also using his highest level nukes, while I'm using whatever the mob's weakness is. So, to take a look at whats up damage wise, I turn off the filters and quickly notice that he is kicking the CRAP out of me for damage. It wasn't even funny, and the guy seemed like a bit of a noob too! I got resisted like 10 times more often then him, and even when I wasn't resisted he still did far more damage. It was very sad, especially since I'd just picked up a Seer's Crown +1 for 3 more INT that I figured would put a big dent in the number of times I get resisted. Either way, I'm still leveling BLM quite quickly, and I haven't had any complaints about my abilities so I guess I'm doing well enough. . . though I am going to need to talk to a few BLM friends about how things work. At any rate, my success with leveling BLM has inspired me to aim for high levels in WHM soon, so hopefully I'll be knocking off G1 and my AF soon enough.

{luck} {You can have this.}

{See you again!}

Good Times

Well, I have to say, I haven't felt this good about FFXI in a very, very long time. I'm actually ENJOYING leveling. Keep in mind, pretty much all my jobs except WHM are either in the dunes or in qufim, both of which. . .eh. . .you know. But yea, its really fun right now, and none of that emo junk I often seen in other FFXI blogs.

I've gotten my BLM to 25, THF to 27, and leveled my marksmenship significantly along with helping several linkmates with various lower level junk.

Lots of fun.

Events

Well, I've gotten a LOT done since I last posted, so I'll take a moment to summarize things.

Sodako
- WAR to 18
- WHM to 41
- NIN to 19
- THF to 20
- BLM to 23
- MNK to 10
- SAM to 10 (well, in an hour or two anyways, 8 at the moment)
- all non-ToAU jobs unlocked (haven't picked up ToAU yet)
- all ninja scroll quests except that stupid shining subligar one done, because the subligar are like 10k each, and I'm not paying that much
- Teleport-Yhoat quest done
- Made about 400-500k, not counting the BCNM action
- 7/7 on BCNM40 Royal Jelly. . . . . despite the easy victories, so far the best drops so far have been. . . . wait for it. . . . 2 scrolls of erase, which currently go for next to nothing thanks to undercutters
- Almost done getting another scroll of drain off a temporary mule created for just that purpose (150k last I checked)

Arigan
- Nothing at all beyond being used to sell a crapload of things and storing all my subjob's subjob's subjob's gear

Beyond that, I chose classes for the next quarter (starts september 25th, very late. . .oh, almost forgot, College since no one reading this probably knows that I'm in college or anything as far as my education goes), which are going to be japanese, which I plan on using in game, and economics, which I already know most of but I'm just doing it for credits really. And no, I'm not freaking taking japanese just because of FFXI. . . . . . or because of anime. . . I just want to learn it.

Theres another little bit thats happened that needs a bit of explaining. . . or at least I feel like explaining it. I grew up playing hockey (roller and ice), baseball, and soccer. After a few years of playing it I dropped soccer and kept doing baseball and hockey. Another few years later, I stopped doing baseball and kept going with just hockey. Now I'm 19, have been playing hockey for 12 years, and am just coming off of a half-year break since I last played. I won't get into the specific city, but near where I live theres an NHL (national hockey league) team, and theres a place with 4 rinks where that team practices, and where people can come and skate or sign up to play hockey. For most of my life as far as I can remember, my dad has played (goalie) with a team there that has kept a number of the same people in it throughout the whole time, and since I turned 18, he stopped playing for them and I started, sort of. So far I've been playing sort of off-and-on, for instance I didn't play last season but I did play the season before that. So, recently, I found out they needed a goalie, and as a result, I'm gonna be playing goalie for 'em this season, which I really enjoy. I also play defense, but I tend to go through a sort of cycle where I'll play defense for a while, decide I like goalie more, play goalie for a while, decide I like defense more, then play defense for a while and repeat the whole thing over the course of a year or so. Why did I want to explain all that? I dunno, it might be because my favorite part of FFXI is the social interaction and to me putting random crap like this out there is part of it. Honestly I don't know.

Another thing I've done since the last post I made was a little experiment with the people of FFXI. I put "people who /check others more than once are noobs" in my bazaar message, and, to my horror, pretty much everyone who examined me immediately proceded to /check spam me. What? Do I have to wait until level 60 to interact with someone over the age of 12? Or is it just that no one who has any degree of maturity /checks people often?

I also had a fun experience with a random jackass in valkurm when I was leveling. . . hell I don't remember what I was leveling because I've spent so much time there in the last while. Basically, I'm sitting near Selbina looking for a group, and this random person named Laqa runs past, /checks me, and randomly /slaps me. I didn't appreciate the /slap, so I threw out a /em laughs at the noob. After some whining from her, and some of the best misuse of the english language I've seen in a long time from someone masquerading as an intelligent player, she concluded by calling me "small time". Now, as I'd only seen that bit, which was fairly tame, I figured she wasn't too much of a moron, just didn't use english that well, like most people who speak it. But, sadly, I was being too optimistic. After a couple minutes I got a random /tell from her that mostly just have "FVCK YOU FAGGOT".

Lets see. After that, I had a pretty good idea of Laqa's personality. She tries to maintain that shes not stupid or a noob in public chat, keep her image, whatever. Appears to have a pretty big ego, probably fueled by some high level job that makes her think shes better than everyone else cause shes wasted more time on a game, and shes pathetic enough that she intentionally tries to get around the game's foul-language filter (not that I have it enabled anyways, believe me I do my fair share of cussing). To top it off, she uses stuff like "faggot" liberally, which pretty much guarentees shes not the sharpest spoon in the drawer.

All in all, I have to say shes a pretty amusing idiot, if you see her and she randomly /slaps you, have fun with it.

Of Mithra Melee and Full DD Ninjas

I've been screwing around with some statistics with my linkshell leader Draconum, just figuring some things out, and I'm beginning to think that Mithra melee (SAM, DRK, WAR, etc. . .) can compete with its Elvaan counterparts fairly well. As a result I think I'm going to try out SAM on Sodako for a while and see how it goes. Honestly can't say I've seen many Mithra taking this route, usually I either see mage or THF/NIN.

Also concerning NIN. . .I've been doing my best to avoid parties where I'm tank, not because I don't have money, not because I don't have utsusemi, I have both. NIN before 37 just ISN'T a good tank, so I've been DDing as much as possible, and doing pretty well. It hasn't been amazing damage or anything but I'd like to think that I'm doing fairly good damage, and I can always just provoke and tank fairly easily in a party so its not like my NIN can only fill that one purpose.

Yeeeeep just random stuff that doesn't have any real purpose. Maybe I'll put more crap up later.

Oh I almost forgot, this is from last night:





I'm too lazy to photoshop them so its all in a line, so theres a bit of overlap between the two screenies.

Status Report

So, I haven't posted anything in a while, and I figured I'd start making posts randomly as to how far I've gotten, mostly so I can track my progress.

Arigan

Individual quests done: 15

Job levels:






Rank: 1, almost 2

To do list: Subjob, rank 5

Sodako

Individual quests done: 56

Job Levels:


Rank: 5

To do list: Teleport-Vahzl, Teleport-Yhoat, Utsusemi: Ichi, Tonko: Ichi, Kurayami: Ichi, Dokumori: Ichi, Jubaku: Ichi and Hojo: Ichi quests, unlocking all extra jobs, get THF, MNK, and WAR to 10, then level them in valkurm, level BLM to 25 or 30, make money

Random

So, I was just screwing around last night on my Taru alt. . .and I suddenly notice the flashing icon in the top right corner of the screen telling me I have an e-mail. So I quickly log out and check it. . . and for some reason that I'm not going to complain about SE just sort of randomly restored Sodako, the first character I'd made after coming back to FFXI about a month ago.

VERY nice surprise.

So since then I finished off the teleport-dem quest, and now all I need is the teleport-mea one and I'll be set for my teleport spells until yhoat.

While trading in letuce to the hairy (hes toothless I found out) old man in selbina, one of my really good old friends Imacdeath started pretending to be a noob and I followed suit.

Because the screenshots themselves sucked due to the fact that I was using the windower, which caused the stupid console thing to be over like half of the screen each time I took a screenshot, I just transcribed the whole thing.

red = shout
blue = party
purple = linkshell
black = emote

Imacdeath : WHY ARE SHEEEPZ INSIDE THE TOWNZ????!?!!?
Sodako : mebe we nede bowz?/!?1/1/1/
Imacdeath : BOWZ!!!! WHERE ARE DE BOZW!?!???///?!1/!?
Sodako : i dunon....
Imacdeath : u stpidu n00b
[Sodako> we make awesome noobs
Sodako : stfu lamzer
Imacdeath : ANYONE KNOWZ WHERE DEB OZW IS AT????!!?1/1!?1/???
[Virtualboy> imac...noob?
[Sodako> we're shouting about how to kill the {Sheep} in {Selbina}
Imacdeath : u stfu, urz da lamerz... u sux0r
[Imacdeath> lol
[Virtualboy> always has been in my book
[Imacdeath> lol
Sodako : ur momz iz teh sux0r lol
[Imacdeath> :P
[Imacdeath> didn't even know u had a book
Imacdeath : ur momz iz ze sheepZ!!!!1!1!!1//1!shift!
Sodako's eyes brim over with tears.
Imacdeath: SOMONG GIMMEZ GILS AND BOZW SO I CAN KEEL SODAKOZ
Sodako's eyes brim over with tears.
Imacdeath : SOMEONG GIMMEZ GILS AND BOZW SO I CAN KEEL SODAKOZ MOMZ AND GET EXPZ!!!!1!!1!!!
Sodako : my momz is dead ; ;
Imacdeath : Oh.
Imacdeath : sux2bu
Imacdeath : ANYONEZ GOT FREE GILZ???1/???/
[Sodako> imac just out ass-hole'd me
[Imacdeath> lol
Imacdeath watches Sodako rape Melyon from the {back}.
Sodako : stfu noboz j00 sux ; ;
Sodako doesn't have the physical equipment to rape someone from behind.
Imacdeath : u gtfo u st00pid n00bz suxor
Imacdeath hands Sodako a pickle.
Sodako : my dda wlil pwnz joo stfu
Imacdeath : Rayine! U HAVE DA 1337 GEARZ! GIMME GILZ PLZZZ....
Imacdeath : PLZ, I LET U TOUCH SODAKO!!!1/1!11!!
Sodako : /cry
Imacdeath : SEE? SHE LIKES IT !!!!!!1!1!!!
[Sodako> oh god I wonder if anyone is buying this
[Sodako> . . . Melyon keeps feeling me up
[Imacdeath> hahaha
[Sodako> I'ma call a GM claiming hes sexually harassing me
[Imacdeath> ROTLFMAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH [etc. . . .]
[Imacdeath> HAHAHAHAHHHSHAH
[Virtualboy> haha
[Imacdeath> ZOMGHAHAHAHAHAAHAHa
[Imacdeath> haha, that's so awesome
Sodako : zomg Melyon kepes feleing me up ; ; how clal GM??////
Imacdeath : IMMA GM, NOOB, WUT U NEED???
[Sodako> lol
Imacdeath: GIMME GILZ I'LL FIX UR PRBOLME
[Sodako> dude don't impersonate a GM
[Sodako> lol
[Imacdeath> lol
Sodako : tihs guy wit grene name keeps felenig me up ; ;
Sodako : how ban?
[Virtualboy> [GM]Dave: Greetings adventures! I hear that you two are causing trouble in {Valkurm Dunes}.
Imacdeath : SARSYU! YOUZ GOTZ 1337 GEARZ TOO! GIMME GILZ PLEASE.... IM PO0R...
[Sodako> lol
[Imacdeath> lol
randomplayer: can anyone get me near or very close to bastok plx ... would tip but im broke but ill give 12 fire crystals
[Sodako> lol you should actually port this guy
[Imacdeath> laf i doubt he's got the crystal
(Imacdeath) HELLO! THANKZOR FOR JOIN MY PT!
(Imacdeath) J00 NEEZ DA BASKOT
(randomplayer) i cant pay i dont have any gil :(
(Imacdeath) COMEZ TO DA DIRTY OLD MANZ AND HIS SHEEPZ
(Imacdeath) BHUT FIRST
(Imacdeath) DO U HAVE ANY BOZW??? I NEED TO KEELS THIS SHEEPS
(Imacdeath) STEELTITTYZ U COMING???
(Imacdeath) I THINKZ U GOTTAS BE NEAR MY FOR DA MAJIK TO WERK
(Imacdeath) OK, SO BASTKOZ?
(randomplayer) yes plz that would make my life a lot easier
(Imacdeath) OKAYZZ BUT U HAVE NO GILZ???
(randomplayer) i only have 22gil
(Imacdeath) 22 GILZ>???
(randomplayer) yes just startet playing last night
(Imacdeath) DAMN DUDEZ JOOR ONE BROKZ GALKSA
(Imacdeath) AND UR ALREADY LVL 11!?a?a?!?!??
(Imacdeath) WIZH I WAS LVL 11
(Imacdeath) OKAYZ ANwYAYSH
(Imacdeath) BASTOKZH
(randomplayer) yes some nice dude pl me
(Imacdeath) ZOMG!!!LAKHT@!!!
(Imacdeath) PL??!?!?!!!!/1/1/1!???///?!!shitf!!!????
(Imacdeath) DUDE!!!! WHOC AN I GETZZ DA PLZ TOO?!???/?!1?1

and it went on after that, Imac {Teleport-Dem}'d the poor newb who of course didn't have the crystal so we got a great laugh out of it, then I ran off to Bastok to get my tele-dem quest and gave the newb a whole bunch of money making tips. Turns out hes a really nice guy.

<3 The Solonavi

Introduction

Well, basically I was reading a bunch of blogs written by FFXI players from Odin, and I decided to get my own, though I don't particuarly expect anyone to read this, I'm only really writing this to write it. I used to be a 59THF/NIN, but I deleted that character and quit FFXI on June 30, 2005 (character was created December 23, 2004), so within the last month I have started two new characters, deleted the first to make room for my old THF which the POL tech support said would likely be restored, but they couldn't restore it so now I'm waiting for my first new character to be restored. I guess I'll start with some stories about getting characters restored.

When I was first convinced to try to get my character restored by some members of a linkshell that I am currently in (very nice link, got in thanks to an old friend that I knew from my first character), I was extremely excited about getting my character back. Bad move. Not only does it take forever for a character to be restored, you also won't neccesarily get the character back AND you will have NO motivation to play the game until you get the character back (cause who the hell wants to level an unsubbed level 5 WHM in ronfaure when they have a 59 THF on the way?).

So after a few days of waiting, I get an e-mail saying the character restore was successful. I go and check my character list and. . . . . I have Sodako back, my first new character. I figured since the name of my old character was Sorako, it must just be because the names are similar. Of course, POL are cruel and character restore stuff seems to always happen at 6:10 PM PST. Ten minutes AFTER all the people you can call to have your character restored go away. So, I was forced to wait until the next day. I called again, gave them all the info, and waited. At 6:10 PM PST that night, I had Sodako back. Again.

This time I realized something. When they're gathering info about your character so they can restore it, they ask for job levels. Sodako's WHM and BLM levels were extremely close to Sorakos, 3x and 2x respectively. So, the next time I called POL, I didn't give them those levels. Thankfully, this time they didn't restore Sodako. After about 5-6 days of waiting, I got an e-mail saying the restoration failed. I figured that was probably the end of it, but in the hope that I had the deletion date slightly messed up (when you "delete" a character, apparently for the first 3 months its only "cancelled", not "deleted", and originally I had given POL the date my character was "cancelled"), so I told them the date that my character was past the 3 month point, and that evening I got the same e-mail as before, saying the restoration failed.

During this whole process, one of the POL staff members I talked to had something interesting to tell me.

POL: Have you ever had a character restored before?
me: Well, you guys restored the wrong character twice before and the last time the restoration failed.
POL: Well you can't have more than one successful character restoration on one account regardless of whether we restore the wrong character or not.
me: Ok.
POL: Ok so what was the info for the character you wanted restored?

Guess that policy just kinda gets ignored though they say it anyways.

Sadly, the conclusion was that I couldn't get my old character back, but the good part is, honestly, if I had my 59 THF back and had to start at 59, I would've been a complete noob. The sucky part is really only that I have to level my ninja again, which sucked money wise.

Another part of my return to FFXI was the rise in prices of things. I crapped my pants when I saw someone /shouting for a teleport for 5k. When I left, each teleport was 500. After that, I went to the AH and cried when I saw what some things were going for. Leaping boots used to be a mere 300k, now they're up at 1 million or more! This alone would've been enough for me to want my THF back because I had an emperor's hairpin, leaping boots and a monster signa just kinda sitting there. Not to mention 7 million gil to screw around with.

But, thankfully, several of my old friends still play, so I actually have some connections with high level players and don't have to meet completely new people and risk the inevitable noob "friends" that leech as much help as they can off me.