Chapter 0070

“Random spawn dungeon, we’re back.”

Smack!

“Why don’t you announce it in world chat while you’re at it?"

Leviene doesn’t know why, but Erica has been harassing her a lot more lately.

“Cause I want loot. It is so obvious even a simpleton like you should have realized it by now.” Leviene taunted Erica, yet destroying her act of defiance by moving out of Erica’s reach. Erica can’t use her skills against Leviene since they are in the same party, but harmless harassment is fair game.

“And yet the one mocking others made the rookie mistake of announcing her presences to the very mobs she intends to kill. I’d say the rookie is stupider than the simpleton.” Erica provokes Leviene with a smug smile. She made no move to get close to Leviene.

“Can you two not squabble like rugrats?” Sylphie materialized between the two to stop them.

“She started it.”

“She started it.”

When the two troublemakers realized they said the same thing at the same time, they glared at each other, but stopped their petty fights.

“Leviene, change into Altreyes and scout the area. The four of us will start killing the mobs.” Sylphie ordered.

“Are you sure it is a wise? You do remember her horrible sense of direction.” Erica chimed in.

“Yeah, wouldn’t it be better if we just clear the entire dungeon instead. It will give us room to kite if we have to.” The suggest was pure self-interest on Leviene’s part. She did not want to explore a new random spawn dungeon by herself. She could do it given her stealth ability and her endurance stat which extends her flight time to over 2 minutes. Her scouting abilities also increase with the range of her ghost.

“Kiting?” Aetharious asked in a cute voice.

Leviene forgot about the little twerp. He’s so quiet and unassuming. He fades into the background and if she wasn’t actively putting her guard against him, she’d forget he’s in the room. His ability to blend into the background isn’t a class skill either. It is his ability, pure and simple.

After grinding with each for the last couple of days and downing the [Sinister Black Wyvern] together, Leviene slowly lowered her guards against the brothers. She still thinks they have an agenda. As Sylphie pointed out previously, as long as their interest aligns, there is room for cooperation.

“Kiting is attacking a mob from range, utilizing skills to slow or stop the mob from closing in.” Leviene explained. “In order to effectively kite, the kiter needs room to run. If we clear out the room, we won’t have to worry about the mobs we didn’t kill.”

Egarious gave Leviene a puzzled expression. “Is it possible to kite given Erica’s implication of Leviene’s horrible sense of direction?”

“Shut your mouth!”

“What?” Egarious look towards Erica for an explanation, the towards Sylphie when Erica pretends to be deaf and dumb.

Sylphie ignored Egarious.

She studied the layout of the random spawn dungeon. Sylphie knew they could bypass many of the trash mob in the random spawn dungeon. It isn’t hard to bypass the trash mobs either.

Given the teamwork of her party, it is better to clear everything.

“Okay, we’ll clear everything. Everyone tell me if you have a crowd control abilities.” Sylphie announced to the group.”

The brothers remain silent. Erica opened her skill book to see if she had one, then shook her head.

“None on Rayael or Altreyes. Leviene got Sleep, 5 sec duration and Lethargy, slow the target speed by 10% for five seconds. I haven’t assigned my new points yet, so I can extend Sleep duration and Lethargy speed and duration.”

“You will be the main healer then. When you assign your points, make sure to extend Sleep to 10 seconds and Lethargy to 50% speed. Five seconds should be enough time for the dps to down the weak mobs for a bit.” Sylphie ordered Leviene, then to the rest of the group, “Leviene will pull, putting one to sleep and slowing one down while I will root a mob in place with my Thorns & Bramble.”

Leviene pulled out her skill book. At level 46, she had 13 skill points she hasn’t used yet. Five points goes into Sleep to increase the duration to 10 seconds and 4 points to Lethargy to reduce the speed of the mob down to 50% for five seconds. One point goes into:

Heal

Cast Time: 7 seconds

Mana Cost: 75 MP

Range: 20 m

Heal: 300 HP

Leviene further improve Heal by reducing the cast time by 1 second. The most Leviene can reduce to the cast time of Heal to is 3.5 seconds by putting 14 points into the skill. Leviene only had 3 skill points so she could only reduce the cast time of the spell by 0.75 seconds. She wanted to add more points into Heal because she knew her healings skills might not able to out heal the damage dealt.

“Ready?” Sylphie asked.

“My healing spell isn’t as strong as I hope it will be so please toss a HOT on Egarious will you.”

“What aura do you want me to put up?” Aetharious asked the group. Leviene was curious as well. It is good to learn the skills of the other class.

“What aura do you have?”

“I have Agility Enhancement, Strengthening and Mana Conservation. At later stages I can get Constitution, Defense, or Spell Power.”

“We have three melees and two casters. I might switch out to Ayrez if healing isn’t an issue. Put up Agility Enhancement.”

“Okay.”

Grrrr.

Why didn’t the brat put the up the skill earlier when they were farming? Altreyes could use the agility boost, or Leviene can use Mana Conservation.

“Egarious, pull when ready. When there is a group of three or more, let Leviene pull.”

“Okay.”

Leviene watched Egarious tanked the [Frenzied Salmon]. She always thought he was too slow to gain aggro, too cautious in his actions and completely unfocused on the mobs. Instead, Egarious spent most of his time watching out for Aetharious.

Egarious is a good brother. As a tank, he is so so.

Leviene has to reassess her assessment of Egarious. The Paladin grabbed the aggro of the lone [Lizardman] with ease and held the aggro through attacks from Aetharious, Erica and Sylphie. 10 seconds later, the mob was down.

The short Perrian Let was relieved. After fighting the mob, Egarious’ health dropped by only 50%. Leviene can confidently say she can heal through the damage dished out by the 4 mob patrols.

After clearing the room, the first real test of the group’s teamwork appeared. Three mobs appear, a level 45 [Lizardman Shaman], and two level 47 [Lizardman Overseers].

Leviene got into position and cast Sleep on the [Lizardman Overseer] while Sylphie rooted the other [Lizardman Overseer].

Egarious… attacked the rooted [Lizardman Overseer]. Aetharious followed his brother’s target and attacked the [Lizardman Overseer] while Erica and Sylphie attacked the [Lizardman Shaman].

Leviene was constantly cast Heal and while Sylphie switched over to casting heals on Erica. Damage done to the [Lizardman Shaman] was slow. He had been able to get off a heal on himself before Sylphie ordered the brothers to switch their target, “Kill the Shaman first. They heal.”

The brothers realized their mistake and immediately switched over. Once the [Lizardman Shaman] was attacked by the full force of the group, he went down fast. The group focused on the weaken [Lizardman Overseer], but by this time, the other [Lizardman Overseer] was awake and roaring to go.

The [Lizardman Overseer] charged towards Leviene with a vengeance. Egarious was busy building aggro from on the other [Lizardman Overseer] he was fighting, he didn’t realize the other [Lizardman Overseer] was awake from the Sleep spell Leviene cast.

Aggro is very systematic.

Damage X class threat multiplier = aggro gained.

Healing X class reduce threat multiplier = aggro gained by the healer.

Crowd control abilities counts as one unit of aggro.

Aggro from crowd control abilities generally isn’t an issue for the tanks. Most of the time, the tank attacks the cc mob and generates more threat than the player who cast the cc spells.

Healing aggro, on the other hand, is a huge problem for the tank. Before a fight, healers like to cast shield or barrier spells as well as a HOT spells. When fighting one mob, the tanks has to get aggro right away or the mob will head for the healers and one shot them. In a group situation, the tanks have to gain aggro on all the mobs before the HOT ticks or the mobs goes for the healers and one shot them.

Some AOE threat generating skills does damage. If the tanks aren’t careful, they will break the cc mob. Non-damage threat generating skills is best for the situation but those skills tends to be on a long cooldown timer to balance their impressive display.

Leviene got the cc aggro threat as well as the aggro generated by her healing spells.

When Leviene saw the [Lizardman Overseer] come for her, she took flight, flying 30 meters in the air and continued casting her healing spells.

Sylphie saw what Leviene did and followed suit. She is the second player on the aggro list since she healed Erica when she was attacking the [Lizardman Shaman].

The [Lizardman Overseer] went for Aetharious.

Leviene was prepared to cast Heal on Aetharious. In her judgement, the other [Lizardman Overseer] will die before Egarious.

Leviene have little to no impression about Aetharious’ fighting abilities. He was always in the shadow of his brother’s overprotectiveness. His shyness gave him a fragile appearance, like a strong gust of wind will knock him out.

The shy weak impression Leviene had before has been destroyed by the way Aetharious handled the [Lizardman Overseer].

Aetharious executed a complicated set of moves which allow him to avoid the loose mob all the while bursting the [Lizardman Overseer] they were focusing on down.

Egarious was aware his brother was in danger and he executed several mysterious skills which protect Aetharious from damage and gained aggro from the raging mob.

Leviene immediately switched her healing target from Aetharious to Egarious. She had to cast Triage instead of her much strong Heal due to the cast time.

Leviene realized her mistake. She should have top off Egarious before switching her focus to Aetharious. Luckily she had a back up healer. Sylphie cast a heal on Egarious, on top of Leviene’s Triage, the duo was able to raise Egarious HP to an acceptable level before Sylphie switched off to dps.

30 seconds later, the mobs are down.