Let me tell you a tale of shenanigantry, giggles, and tightened sphincters that I had the pleasure of experiencing last night (and I wish I could make this up):
After a short distraction of fighting the enemy faction in an open world PvP zone with some friends, a respawn later and I had noticed two unrelated enemies carrying trade packs through the zone. I pointed this out to one of my friends, who had also respawned, and we grabbed the packs. The owners were unfortunate casualties. Post-debate, we decided we would go all or nothing: take these two trade packs through a large amount of enemy territory, from almost the eastern-most side of the enemy continent, through highly unfriendly seas, and to our own faction's zone for a hefty turn in.
Making our way out of Windscour Savannah, we headed north to Rookboune Basin, where we tested the chance of taking the river upstream in a clipper. Unfortunately, the current was so bad, it pushed us back into Windscour. Along with the clipper, which was now upside down.
Not annoyed in the least by this minor setback, we regrouped past the rampaging rapids, and decided we would re-enact the Fellowship of the Ring, with myself and my friend being the "ring bearers" of sorts, as we were the tankiest in the group of 6 we had assembled. Except we were making our way out of Mordor, and into worse places in some cases. We headed along the eastern side of Rookborne Basin, through an area that head a number of elite enemies (to be fair, the monsters were level 45, but there were a
lot of yetis), which attempted to destroy our poor pack donkeys. For the duration of that side route, we continued on foot, making it to a safe zone of sorts in a neutral town.
I had the brilliant idea of seeing where the incoming airship was heading out, and to our luck it was going directly west, across the mountains, to the equivalent of our starter zone. The thing about the starter zones is that they are "controlled" by a faction, meaning that PvP becomes much more dangerous, as you can only engage an enemy that engages you first, and nobody from your side can assist aside from healing, unless they were stupid enough to use an area of effect attack.
I climb the stairs to the airship, and make my way toward the lowering docking bridge with my friends a few levels down, and to my horror see approximately 15 of the enemy faction starting to leave the airship. I quickly turn around, hoping they didn't notice me, and luck was again on my side as most of them had trade packs themselves, or had no inclination to screw around with a level 50 in a neutral town. We make our way to the airship, and take an uneventful flight across the mountains, deeper into the heart of enemy territory, but a few steps closer to freedom.
We make our way down from the airship into Falcorth Plains, the enemy starter zone. As I mentioned before, this was a time saving, if somewhat risky maneuver, as we had no healers and would be unable to assist one another barring stray attacks on multiple people. We make our way towards the south west, with the only challenges being a dim-witted level 13 who attempted to (and failed at) taking a pack from a fully geared level 50, and an enemy farm cart, whose owner must have had a tightened sphincter for the duration of our moving around him.
We made our way into the Tigerspine Mountains, an area similar to our own second area, and still controlled by the enemy. Trotting our donkeys down the road, quickened by carrots, we strode right into the middle of a large enemy housing province without realizing it. As we approached the southern river, which would have been an avenue of basically freedom and escape, we were almost caught by some patrolling enemy guards (which are level 50, and very, very hurty), causing us to make a quick turnaround and take the opposite side of the road, delaying our departure into rowboats. Feeling the urgency start to catch up, after bypassing the guards we went further along the road, almost running smack dab into a large group of various levels, all huddled around the auction house. Apparently so absorbed in their money making, not a single once of them noticed us. Not. A. Single. One. I almost feel like we could have strode past on our donkeys, announcing ourselves with music, and still not be touched by any of them, as who really expects enemy level 50s in your second levelling zone, the most of which contains the occasional level 20 monster?
We made our way around the preoccupied purveyors of property and pesos, and finally got to the river. The home stretch took us down a fairly well covered, deeply banked river that got us most of the way out of the zone, with only a few waterfalls and a buggy physics engine to contend with. We then noticed our other problem: We would be heading directly through a rather large port town, entirely controlled by the enemy, once we got to Mahadevi. We made our way across to the opposite bank of the river, and climbed the mountain until the point where we could see the open ocean. Freedom in sight, we nearly break our donkeys with fall damage (with someone killing their horse on a longer fall, then noticing that a vine ladder existed to get down that particular cliff), and make it to the beach, where we summon a clipper. I lend some spare fuel to my friend, who activates the clipper's special ability, causing us to speed along the water, practically uncatchable by anything that didn't know where we were, and were on a direct intercept course.
After an uneventful trip across the seas to our own continent, we head to Two Crowns to turn the packs in for Charcoal Stabilizer, a reagent used in crafting and pretty highly valued. Once we get into port, we turn the trade packs in for a whopping 130% turn in rate. Not that I would imagine many people taking packs this distance anyway.
Then, we notice that an enemy trade ship has pulled in directly behind us, getting ready to offload its contents for a similar role in retrieving Charcoal Stabilizer.
Perfect.
I slap on my recently made swim fins and diving helmet, which I had made previously in that same day, and Lasso a delicious looking, squishy target off the trade ship. The fins and helmet were for the fact that if anyone is killed with a pack, they drop it, and it usually sinks all the way to the bottom of the ocean. We were well out of the range of the neutral guards as this occurred, and it became a feeding frenzy of sort, with everyone getting at least one or two packs from the enemies as they unloaded, stupidly, out of the neutral guards' ability to assist.
Then, my friend noticed that the owner of the boat had stepped off, but forgot to refresh his Owner's Mark in his haste to sell the trade packs. For reference, the Owner's Mark makes it so that any vehicle will last 1 minute, 30 seconds, during which anyone who is not the owner of that vehicle cannot attempt to drive it. I was to Lasso the person who owned the boat away, so that they would not be able to return in time to attempt refreshing the buff again.
And thus, we ended up jacking the enemy trade ship. We drove it around the harbor while still in waters within our own faction's control, meaning they were subject to the same rules as we were previously: They could only attack us if we attacked them first. A few daring adventurers attempted to run into us one at a time or stealth on to sneak away with a pack, but much like a low ELO League of Legends match, they simply got focused down one at a time as they walked in single file into a teamfight, a warning to those 20 or so enemy characters who had been on the trade ship and now were swimming around like sharks waiting for the kill. Or more like goldfish, as they seemed to forget that their teammate just got obliterated three seconds later, and would send fodder after us like this for a while.
We kept the enemy trade ship moving around in circles in a small bay well east of the turn in point, so if they did manage to get on, we would have plenty of time to hunt down any stragglers. We summoned our own galleon, a behemoth of a ship with 4 cannons to a side, and began laying broadside after broadside volley into the trade ship, all while avoiding our persistent pursuers and preventing our own ship from being appropriated Finally, the enemy ship broke, and the trade packs were ours to take, with everyone from our small, still 6 man group each getting at least one pack from the trade ship itself.
We turn in the packs to Ezna harbor, right as ANOTHER enemy trade ship comes in. They were with the same guild as the previous goofballs, and were forewarned enough to not leave the wheel of the ship unmanned, but we managed to get a few stragglers as they ferried trade packs inbetween the ship and the turn in point. We turn in whatever else we can scrounge from the harbor floor, and finally begin wrapping up for the night. I play a little customized music tune, recognizable as the first three seconds of the Final Fantasy 7 Victory Fanfare, bowing to and thanking each of the contributing enemy faction members in turn, as they (unintentionally) provided a sizable boost in income and crafting materials to our guild.
I finally realized after the elation of the last two and a half hours' events that I should have gone to bed, well, two hours ago, as it was now 6:30am. I went to bed giddy with anticipation of future nights such as this, and fell asleep with a cat at my side and a smile on my face.
ArcheAge. The level of shenanigantry that can be accomplished in this game while with a group of competent people is truly amazing. While it still falls short in the current state of the game compared to some other MMORPGs, it has a lot going for it that those other western MMOs don't have, as it is not trying to be "just another WoW clone/killer."
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Topic: How did you last *own*? (Read 1350326 times)