Double Pet Rewards Return

KI is offering double pet experience for members again.  Not sure when it ends as I can’t find a mention on the KI site and all it says on the opening page of the game is that it’s for a limited time.  Last time it was something like 4 or 5 days.

It’s a great opportunity to level some pets fast.  Every snack you feed provides twice the normal XP and every pet game you play gives twice the points.  So if you get all 4 points for playing a game, you get 8 and if you then feed your pet Fancy Yogurt (50 XP) you get another 100.

If you’re gardening and harvesting lots of top-level mega snacks (40-50 points) this means you can get 88-108 XP per pet game!  Not only is it a great time to finish leveling up some pets, it’s also a great moment to do some hatching and race your new pets up to mega.

Last time I got a one month membership for my non-member account so I could take full advantage.  This time I think I’m just gonna work on pets for the two member accounts.

For this few days I’m planning on not re-planting any crops that reach elder harvest so I can use all my energy for pet training instead of gardening.

Take advantage while you can!

Animation Fatigue

As I’m moving closer to the two year anniversary of starting to play Wizard101, I’m finding that I grow more and more weary of the huge amounts of time I waste watching the same animations over and over.

While there’s a lot of amazing and imaginative stuff and I really appreciated the artfulness of it when I started, I’m just tired of it.

I’ve seen all the gardening spell animations probably thousands of times at this point.  And I could care less if I ever see them again.  Each animation takes maybe five seconds to run and then there’s always a lag of a few more seconds before you can cast the next.  Sounds like not that much.  But when you cast 8-10 spells every time you tend gardens and you have six or seven wizards doing it, those seconds start adding up to minutes and hours.

Same  thing for the slow animation on Grumpy Gobblers. Or in the Maze game, the fact that there’s no way to stop it and just get your points if you hit the minimum score for getting 4 points while there’s still time left.

The worst though, is the long slow process of sitting through the same animations over and over during battles.  It’s one the biggest reasons I don’t often work with big teams.  If there are four of you and four opponents, every round of a battle takes for frigging ever.  And yes, some of those animations are incredibly cool but after the first dozen times, the coolness factor fades.

I feel like I should be able to log in, tend gardens, play a couple of pet games, finish a few quests and get out in an hour but the animations mean every visit stretches so much longer than the time I want to spend.

I realize it’s probably not technically possible but I wish they could set up a section of the servers for no animation so those of us who don’t want to watch the endless repetition and lose all that extra time could choose a server where the animations either don’t run or take an instant.  The rest of the servers could keep everything as is for those who want to see it all.

Just a dream.  I’ll get over being cranky about it one of these days …

Training Points — thoughts at the end of the free buy-back

KI surprised me late last week by announcing another free training points buy back for members just a few months after they had the first one.  I assumed it would be at most a twice a year event.

The first time I felt there were just a few of my earlier wizards who needed to be revamped.  But in the meantime, I’ve been rethinking the training points so this time I actually wound up trading them in for several wizards on my two membership accounts.

If I knew they would keep periodically offering the free buy-back I might actually change my strategy to get one set of spells in the early stages, then buy them back for free and get a slightly different set for later on.  I’ve also reached the point that my two highest level wizards have training points I’m not bothering to use.

Here are a few of the ways I’m currently using the points:

For Life, I start off working on getting Tower Shield.  Since I don’t use the Ice damage cards and the first two are damage, I wait until I have 3 points and can pick up the Volcanic Shield (order of spells:  Frost Beetle, Snow Serpent, Volcanic Shield), then wait until I have two more, to get Evil Snowman and Tower Shield.

The usual advice is to get Death to Feint.  I eventually get there, but I don’t see a big need for Feint before the end of Marleybone or the Onis in Mooshu.  Beyond Ghoul, which I sometimes get for low-level wizards, using Death spells for non-Death wizards isn’t worth the pips they take, especially once you start getting some power pips.  So, other than Dream Shield (shields against Life and Myth), which I DO sometimes pick up as well, I wait to use any more training points on Death until I’m farther along.

For non-Life wizards, my first concern is usually to pick up Life spells because I really want Sprite in my arsenal as soon as I can get it.  Some wisdom says to take Life to Satyr, and I followed that advice at first.  I’ve since decided Satyr isn’t worth it if you’re not Life because of the pips (see more about why here).

After I quit going to Satyr, for a while I went to Spirit Armor.  I’m getting so I don’t want to use up three pips (or more if there are power pips) for that either, so for several wizards I’d taken to Spirit Armor, I bought back the points and just took them to Sprite as I redid their points.  On the way to Sprite you also pick up Legend Shield (shields against Death and Myth).

Once I’ve gotten non-Life wizards to Sprite, I turn my attention to Ice, getting all the spells to Tower Shield.  The nice thing is you get Volcanic Shield (shields against Fire and Storm) on the way to Tower.  Some people get Fire to Glacial Shield (Storm and Snow) as well.

I always buy Gobblestone’s Pendant (Fire shield), Greebly’s Gemstone (Snow Shield) and Rotunda’s Torc (Storm shield) amulets ASAP, so once I have Volcanic Shield for my deck I can put on the Greebly’s Gemstone and shield against Snow, Fire and Storm with a combo of the spell and the amulet so I don’t get Glacial Shield.

After I’ve got those basics, I pick up Reshuffle when I hit level 22 and, depending on the wizard’s school, either the Spirit or Elemental blades and traps at the appropriate levels (traps at level 20, blades level 25).  After those I go back to working on Death to Feint.

You can use Feint TCs and there’s some equipment (including Pets) that gives Feint so it isn’t a necessity.  I don’t ever use it unless I’m up against a boss (or three 🙂 ).  I keep changing my mind about it, but right now, having realized that later on I won’t be using all the training points, I’ve gone back to getting it.

Once I get Feint I start saving training points until I get to Celestia and can start collecting some Star and Sun spells.  My level 70+ wizards have some points just sitting there, because I haven’t wanted all the Star and Sun spells and I’m not interested in the Moon spells.

If I knew that the free buy back would happen a few times a year, I’d start everybody off taking Life to Spirit Armor and possibly get a couple of shields from Sabrina Greenstar and then do the buyback when they’re a little higher.  On the second round I wouldn’t use points for shields and I’d get Life just to Sprite.

I don’t play PvP but I know they have their own strategies so check elsewhere if you want advice on using training points for PvP.  I’ve also quit choosing a “secondary school”, which I explained here.

Strategies about training points become more clear as you go higher and are different depending on whether you spend time on PvP or PvE.  These free buy backs are a great opportunity KI has started offering; you can make some mistakes and get a chance to re-do once you understand more.  After you get more than a few, buying back the points with Crowns becomes VERY pricey so keep an eye out for these free buy-back offers and use them well.

Stacking blades

 

It’s taken me a while to learn some of the complexities of stacking blades [and all the same info can be applied to traps; just using blades to keep it simple].  As you get to higher levels and tougher bosses it can be very useful to know how to stack a bunch of blades and traps so you maximize the damage one big spell can do.

Not all of these apply to the true beginners to whom this blog is mainly dedicated; first, you don’t particularly need to be stacking and second, some schools wait quite a while to get a blade or trap and then still can’t get the Spirit and Elemental Blades, etc. until level 25.  But there’s a little bit you can do if you just want to wow your team mates.

Most people seem to know they can cast their own school’s blade and also a Spirit or Elemental Blade and, if they have it, also a Balance blade (if you’re not Balance, from gear). When you have all those in place, if you cast, say, a Scarecrow* (400 base damage), the Crow gets a 40% boost from the school blade, taking it to 560.  Then the 560 gets a 35% boost from the Spirit Blade,taking it to 756.  Then the Balance blade adds 25%, taking it to 945.  So a few blades can more than double the damage of one Scarecrow — and of course it’s an all-enemies spell, so every opponent gets hit by that.

The less-talked-about stacking possibilities arise because the same blade from different sources is counted as a separate blade.  This includes treasure cards from different sources. If you look at Treasure Cards in the Bazaar, sometimes you’ll see one type of care listed several times.  This is because they’re from different sources.  One group might be from gardening drops, another from boss drops, and another from some pack.  Each one of those counts separately.  If you’re into seeing how big a hit you can make — rather than just garnering a big enough strike to win — you want to stack a bunch of blades and traps.

So, for instance, if you cast a Death blade from your school, and also a Treasure Card Death blade, and your pet casts a Death blade** (or you have the card from your pet), they’ll all multiply the damage of one spell.  The Treasure Card versions of all the blade and trap spells count as a separate type of card–with the variations in those also counting as separate–and the same is true for the blades and traps cast by or added to your deck by pets.

So, in the above example, starting from 945, if you pet has also cast a Death blade, that adds an extra 40%.  So 945 becomes 1323.  And if you also cast a treasure card Death blade, that adds another 45% and 1323 becomes (rounded down) 1918.  Of course, the order in which you’ve cast the spells will determine the order in which these percentages are added, so the totals will change depending on that, but it’s going to be a big boost to the base damage of whatever spell you choose regardless of the order of casting.

You could also add Treasure Card versions of the Balance blade, Dragonblade and Spirit blade, which add 30% and 40%, respectively.  And, obviously, if you’ve also stacked some traps you start multiplying damage exponentially.  TCs are one way to give lower level wizards some boosting power, especially if you can trade them over from another account.

Partway through Azteca (and after hitting level 86), wizards can train Sharpened Blade and Potent Trap.  These are “enchantment” spell cards.  You can add a Sharpened Blade to a blade (most are eligible but some of the gear blades won’t take it nor do most –possibly all– treasure cards) and get another 10% added to your blade.  For instance, a 40% Death Blade becomes 50%.  And once you’ve cast a blade with the boost from Sharpened Blade, that’s considered different from a regular Death Blade, so you can cast one with Sharpened Blade added and one without and both will be added to the damage.  Potent Trap is basically the same, a boost you can add to most kinds of traps.

Before Azteca, if you grow Sword Ferns you can get Sharpened Blade treasure cards and use those.  Most of the varieties of these can’t be bought  or sold.  Even though you can’t train the spell until level 86, if you get the TC you seem to be able to use it at any level (I haven’t checked it out very much as I don’t see it as necessary in the lower levels but I have experimented with a few lower levels using it.

If you have a high level wizard on your account who has been training pets, you can pass a pet with a blade casting talent through the Shared Bank to a new wizard.  And, for those who can afford it, some crown gear (including items from much-less-expensive packs) for low level wizards includes a blade card of one sort or another.

For instance, I got a Mythic Beast from a Hoard of the Hydra pack (when on sale for 199) who provides a Bladestorm card, which gives a Balance blade to everyone on your team.  It’s a nice little boost in Unicorn Way…

I generally equip all my wizards with gear that boosts damage and I’ve been working on getting all my pets to add a damage boost as well so the total damage is even higher because it starts off boosted by the equipment.  In the picture above, the damage came in part from just a few stacked blades and traps and from gear.

And I’ve been having fun — in my penchant for creating wizards and deleting them somewhere in or at the end of Krokotopia– passing mega pets (from the same account) and treasure cards (from one of the other accounts) and watching them storm through the lower levels with way more oomph than they need. 🙂

But you can see from this example, it can make a huge difference, particularly if you like to solo, if you know how to stack blades to get the most out of your best spells.  You can send spells off at four times, five time, six times their normal base–or more– and do some massive damage.

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* I chose this one because the base damage is such a nice easy number to start calculating from.

** Having your pet cast it at a moment you actually need it…  that’s a tale for another post.

 

Some ins and outs of energy

I can’t afford to buy endless crowns (or even to buy them very often) which means gardening and pet training, for me, require staying within energy limits so I don’t have to keep paying to refill energy.  I’ve run up against three areas in which the issue arises:  (1) how much energy does it take to fill all of the needs in the garden; (2) how much energy does it take to replant a crop after it has hit final harvest; and (3) can your energy globe refill in between visits?

The first issue is about planning a garden around needs.  You always want the needs of your plants, should all of them be required at once, to add up to no more energy points than you have.

Another issue arises when it comes to planting.  Unlike the needs, for which you can stack plants and fill all the needs for many plants with one spell, planting uses energy for each individual seed planted.  So a maximum mega garden, with 69 plants, requires 138 energy points to replant.

Now you could just plant some at one time and then plant more later.  But you lose a lot of the energy-saving advantage of a big plot because if they’re planted at different times they will probably have needs at different times, which means you have to cast  spells more often.  So I never plant more of a particular type than the energy it would take to replant all of them at once–far less than 69.  See here for more on energy and planting.

The third issue I’m running into as some of my wizards reach higher levels arises because the rate at which energy refills never changes.  Beyond a certain point, the extra energy you’ve received as you level up doesn’t help as much as it should because no amount of leveling ever changes the rate at which energy refills.  The problem is worse for non-members, but it’s there for members as well.

I don’t fish, so I don’t have examples for that and pet training for me just gets fit around energy use from gardening.  So all examples relate to gardening.  I always have some plants that require tending needs twice a day, which means I tend the needs of everything in the garden twice a day.  As my wizards have leveled up, I’ve hit the point where the globe isn’t anywhere close to full again when I log in the second time.

For non-members energy refills at a rate of 1 point every 10 minutes, or six energy points per hour.  For members it refills at 1 point every 7.5 minutes, or eight energy points per hour.  Depending on how much energy gear you have, for both types of memberships the globe can be full again eight or ten hours later if you’re somewhere in the forties or below (I haven’t made a note on the exact level where that changes–and, again, it will vary with energy gear).

The higher you go, however, the bigger the percentage of the globe that won’t be refilled on the second round.  For a member, in eight hours you will have gotten 64 energy points back.  Morgan D. at this point has 117 energy points, with a base of 87 and energy gear adding 30.  Her garden, on the days when all needs have to be filled and the 48-hour pest spells have to be re-cast, uses pretty much all of her energy on the first visit.

When she comes back in eight or ten hours to take care of the needs again, the globe has only refilled 64-80 points.  The Couch Potatoes always have all the needs both times, so they take 35 energy points twice a day.  Fortunately, the Evil Magma Peas tend to have only pests or pests plus one need on the second visit so they don’t take as many points and the garden can be cared for even though her energy hasn’t refilled.  Pet training (or fishing if I had any desire to do it) is relegated to a few games here and there.

For Heather G., on the non-member account, it’s a tougher story.  At level 52, her base energy is 76 and she gets 20 extra points from energy gear for a total of 96.  The first visit each day uses almost all her energy.  If I go back in eight hours, 48 points (50%) have been restored.  Ten hours gets her to 60 and she can just meet the needs on the second round, but it’s not always easy for me to make two visits a day with ten hours in between.

The CPs always need 35 of those points.  If the EMPs need any more than one pest spell on the second visit, she doesn’t have enough energy within eight hours to take care of them.  She also has a few miscellaneous “like” plants that require an extra 3 point spell on some visits.

Except for the days when she’s just replanted one type or the other (no needs for about 24 hours usually) pet training is pretty much out the window for her until she’s amassed enough mega snacks to quit gardening for a while.  It takes 16 hours from zero to completely refill her globe so there’s really no twice-a-day-use-all-energy schedule possible.  If she uses all the energy on one visit, she simply won’t have a refilled globe the next time.

Even if I didn’t find fishing to be a big snooze –not to mention a giant “spend crowns on energy” enticement — it wouldn’t be possible as long as I have gardens.

The main result for my highest level wizards:  even though they have lots more energy, they really can’t grow gardens that are much bigger than my mid-level wizards.  Since no amount of leveling up gets you a faster rate of energy refill, at, for instance, level 75 you can’t get enough energy back in 8-10 hours to take care of a garden much bigger than you had at level 45.

I realized long ago that KI wants as many people as possible refilling energy as often as possible, so on one level I understand why they never give a break.  But it actually winds up giving wizards a declining percentage of usable energy as they level up.  Just feels odd to me that sticking with the game and leveling up into the higher realms leads you to a disadvantage when it comes to energy.

Sure would be nice if at a couple of levels you could get a boost into higher energy refill rates.  Say, at level 50 it goes up from 1 point every 7.5 minutes to whatever it would take to get 9 points/hour instead of 8 (or 1 point every 9 minutes instead of every 10 for non-members) and at level 75 you get 1 point every 6 minutes (10/hour) for members and 1 point every 7.5 minutes (8/hour) for non-members.  You still wouldn’t completely refill but it would help.

In the absence of that fantasy, you need to be a little careful as you plant about whether the type you’re planting has very many needs a second time.  Or whether it can stay healthy 24 hours without a second round of tending.

Some plants, like CPs and EMPs have a tendency to go into progress to dead if they don’t have their needs met in something under 24 hours (you can look at charts for each plant on the wiki though they don’t take likes into account on the hours you can go without casting plant spells).   I’ve found twice a day, with 8-12 hours in between, works best to keep them all healthy.

Pink Dandelions and Sword Ferns, on the other hand, do fine on a once a day plan.  The only thing is, once you log in and go to the vicinity of the plants, you need to meet all the needs.  [I’ve never figured out exactly how they have it programmed, but your presence triggers something when it comes to needs…]

Since some plants do pretty well if you just go in once a day, if you want to train pets or fish as well as gardening you might want to choose plants you only need to tend once.  Then, as you level up enough that you’re only getting a portion of your energy back by later in the day, you can use whatever amount has refilled for training or fishing.

If you’re thinking that high level means a huge supply of energy, you need to be aware that the slow refill rates mean you don’t actually have all that much more that’s usable unless you can afford to refill energy every day.  If you don’t garden or keep only plants that can be tended once a day, you get the advantage of having a bigger globe one time a day.

At lower levels you can get used to the idea that you can go in once and come back hours later to a refilled energy globe but once you level up enough you’ll realize the percentage that has refilled decreases the higher you go.  Plan accordingly.

Quests, gardens, pets and more — how do I choose?

One of my great dilemmas in the game has become how to spend my time.   When I began and didn’t know much about pets or gardens I just quested.  But once I started working on pets and gardens I started having trouble juggling.

Crafting initially sent me into the world of gardening.  Since I’d not done any, I basically stopped questing and started gardening for all six wizards (at the time I just had the one account).  At first it didn’t seem too time consuming.  But once they’d all had a number of harvests, I started bumping into constant messages about too many treasure cards leading to selling cards at the Bazaar leading to messages about too much gold…

If you garden very much, it becomes common to have to stop in the middle of harvesting to sell TCs (unless you don’t mind losing lots of them).  The low gold limit also starts getting in the way so you also have to buy stuff.  Then you have too much stuff and you have to constantly clear things from houses, attic, shared bank, etc.  For six wizards it took 1-2 hours to get through it all.

Lots of plants need care twice a day.  I find generally the second round doesn’t require as many spells but it still takes time and is still subject to all the sidetracking because of maximum TC, gold, attic, and housing slot limits.

Pet training is also time consuming  And for me it requires all the gardening because I won’t do it without mega snacks — preferably snacks with a minimum of 40 XP.  Between the slow animations and the long lags here and there in the games, playing very many games takes a chunk of time.

Most days I spend more time than I want to on Wizard101 in total and all I’ve done is take care of gardens and a little pet training.  Questing winds up sidelined sometimes for weeks at a time.

With the second and third accounts I sometimes got a one month membership and quested like mad for those few weeks (second account is also now a membership account).  But Morgan (level 75 Death) has been in Zafaria since last summer.  The only thing left is the final dungeon but, in the meantime, I had her helping Rylee (level 70 Life) on dungeons and Rylee got close enough that I’m catching her up so the two can face Morganthe together.

At the moment I’ve got two wizards on each account growing good-sized gardens and one or two wizards on each account have a pet I’m satisfied with.  However, I’m still hatching and training to get the pets I want for others, which means keeping the gardens going to get those snacks.

Current plan is to stockpile enough mega snacks to shut down the gardens for a while.  I’ve got great supplies of reagents, both for individual wizards and in the shared bank of the first two accounts so crafting is in good shape for shutting down gardens.  Once most of the wizards have a great pet, I’d like to stop gardening and pet training for a long period.

I really want to get Morgan and Rylee to level 100!  But it’s been a struggle to weigh the importance of the different aspects of the game.  And how much time I want to devote to it.

I’m interested in stories from others about how you prioritize the different aspects of the game.  Or do you just play 10 hours a day so you can do everything?  Do you quest and ignore pets and gardens?  Train pets to the exclusion of all else?  How would you tell a beginner to plan out the different aspects of the game?

Life girls in the Great Spyre

Racing over the weekend–the end of my one month membership) to get Heather G. (Life, level 50), on the third account, leveled up enough to have the energy for my garden plans, I paired her with Jasmine R. (Life, level 52) from the first account to do the main quests in Crystal Grove, Drake Hatchery, Forum and the Great Spyre.

I didn’t take notes so I can’t give a run-through but there are several things in that dungeon that have puzzled me the last couple of times I’ve been through.  I haven’t found at guide to this dungeon that has seemed to reflect the current set-up.

Most guides are old and refer to three crystals you have to get in order to open the door to the Crown of Fire.  Apparently at one time you had to click on them all simultaneously (in other words you had to go in with at least two other people).  I don’t think I’ve ever clicked on three crystals although  a friend came in with me the first time and she did the crystals since she’d done it before.

This time I fought Gurtok Firebender (and minions) and went through Dragon’s Maw, where it’s quite easy to pass the two sets of mobs (including a Boss) and went out the door at the other end to click on the crystal.  As soon as I clicked there was a message that the door had unlocked.

Confused, but believing the guides, I then went back and beat Gurtok Piercer (and minions) to get into Howling Cave.  I tried every which way to get around the mob in there, but wound up having to fight to get through to the other side.  Where I was at exactly the same crystal I went to the first time.

The back doors to Howling Cave and Dragon’s Maw are on either side of the crystal.  I saw no other crystals at the entrances to those two areas, as discussed in some of the guides.  I clicked on no other crystals and waltzed right through the door into Crown of Fire.

I’m reasonably sure I could have gotten in after I got through Dragon’s Maw and clicked on the crystal the first time but I have to test that out the next time I go in.  If you only have to fight one of the Gurtoks, I recommend Gurtok Firebender which clears the way into Dragon’s Maw since you can get through to the crystal without having an extra battle.

The next time you go in you might want to at least trying defeating him, getting through to and clicking on the crystal and before you fight anybody else, go to the door to the Crown of Fire and see if you can get through.

I also thought I remembered having to pick up one of the books for the book quest by getting through one of those two side areas and out onto a ledge but I couldn’t find it and my quest didn’t include one there any more.

I really had no trouble getting through with those two level-appropriate Life wizards.  Heather had some Forest Lord treasure cards and I used those for two of the big fights, which really helped by knocking out all the minions early on.  They were both equipped with pets who could and did cast sprite and unicorn, which helped though I have a notion they’d have made it through ok without the extra heals.

Both wizards had Rebirth in their decks and that came in handy a few times.  It also helped that I had both equipped with gear that gave them extra pips and extra damage so with careful blading and trapping they were able to take everybody out quite readily.

I’ll never understand why so many players think Life is too weak to get anywhere.  Heather and Jasmine actually did everything in Dragonspyre until the Academy solo.

The other puzzling thing in this dungeon is that the quest helper doesn’t work except to keep pointing you to Crown of Fire.  It makes it really annoying/frustrating to do the rest because it isn’t clear what you need to do next or where you need to go to do it.  I always wind up doing this one toggling back and forth between the game and some guide left open in my browser.  But, as noted, the guides often lead me wrong…

As has happened so many times before (but not every time) my one month subscription that said it would end on May 24 actually ended at the end of the 23d.  I could have used the extra day to finish another level but by this time I kind of knew there was a chance it would happen.  It’s a head-scratcher for me that if KI tells you a sale or pet days or Lost Pages ends on the 24, you have all day on the 24th to buy or get or do but if  you have a membership that says it ends on the 24th it really ends on the 23d (once I didn’t even get all of the day before).

Mysterious happenings in the Labyrinth

Since I signed up for another one-month membership on my third account (to take advantage of double gardening days), I decided to level Heather G. (level 48) up some more since she has enough seeds now to plant a large patch each of Evil Magma Peas and Couch Potatoes but she’s a few points short of enough energy to take care of them.

She hit the Labyrinth quest a bit before getting to level 48 and I went back to lots of not-done side quests to get her to level 48 so she could take care of the Life spell quest and the Dean at the same time.

All through the Labyrinth things were a little strange since the last time I was there.  After you get the initial key and head over across the path through the lava, there are three bosses wandering the streets.  In the past I would have sworn that there was one of each and once you defeated one that one was gone.

This time there were multiples wandering around and I accidentally wound up fighting one twice because I hadn’t caught on to the multiples thing and thought since I’d defeated two, only one should be left.  Saw a boss, jumped in and then realized it wasn’t the one I needed.

When I got back into the gated area, same thing, multiple Scarricks and Galladin Palladins wandering around.  I was glad I brought Morgan D. (level 75 Death) in because there were so many of them I wound up in a battle with both Scarrick and Galladin at once.

At one point, I dropped down into one of those little culs-de-sac where, in DS, no mobs wander, to stay away from the mob.  Something went wrong and the game wouldn’t let them back up.  I even took one of them off the dual mount and had her try to walk up the steps but nothing would allow them to get back up to the street.  Finally had to port them to Basilica and use dungeon reset to get back to finish the dungeon.

In the picture at the top, they’re at the highest point they could reach and unable to move forward.  I could move the mount back down the steps and around in the cul-de-sac but on neither side could they get back to the street.

Something wound up not taking about the spell quest so I had to do most of the Labyrinth again (you have to do all but the last two fights to get into the area where Scarrick roams).  There weren’t as many multiples but more than one of all the bosses roamed each area.  Didn’t venture into the side area so I don’t know if it was just a fluke that they got stuck there.

I know in the past it could get frustrating, with just one each of the bosses, to find the one you wanted.  But this thing with multiples is also kind of confusing and makes it harder to keep track of what you’ve completed.

Smaller Obsidian Chest Quest

Heather G. on the third account has arrived at the Labyrinth.  I like to do that one with two accounts even though I’ve soloed it several times, so I looked over the choices and realized Jasmine R. had just entered Dragonspyre Academy.

So I picked up the Obsidian Chest quest, thinking then I could have her ready to pick up the last one.   I figured she could help Heather and pick up the Labyrinth Chest at the same time.  Then I set out for Krokotopia since the quest helper pointed me to the Royal Hall.

Picked that one up and then decided I was sure I remembered a couple in WC, so I looked at the quest.  I saw one in Haunted Cave but noted there wasn’t another there and weren’t any more in Krok though I thought I remembered picking up two.

Next stop was Chelsea in MB but the second one there again didn’t show up.  Then I went to Mooshu, where I went to Ancient Burial Grounds and got dragged into battle when I tried to skirt around and get the chest.  After defeating Crazed Forest Spirit (amazing since I’d not fixed my deck and had no Life Prisms) I was stunned to be directed back to Ashley (Dragonspyre Fire tree, who gives the quest).  Checked quests and indeed, nothing there indicated any more chests.

While I’m pleased that you no longer have to do the Labyrinth twice, I’m a little disappointed that I can no longer knock two quests off at once by doing it with two accounts.  Heavenly, though, to so quickly finish that quest without having to run all over.  You used to have to go nine places and now it’s just four!

I never saw an announcement on this.  I couldn’t find it mentioned in the latest updates  A Google search revealed no recent articles mentioning it.  Even the wiki still shows nine stops for the quest though there’s a note at the top mentioning the change and asking for it to be updated.

Meanwhile, Heather hasn’t gotten to her level 48 spell yet (she’s just hit 47) and I don’t want to do the Labyrinth without being able to defeat Skarrik Gallowgaunt while I’m in there so she can collect Rebirth.  So I’m wandering back to some side quests, hoping to push her up there.   Gives me time to figure out someone else to second her…  Probably gonna be Morgan D. (level 76) since her power will make it go faster 🙂

A nice mid-level garden

I’ve been playing around for a while with different ways to configure gardens, always working on keeping the gardens within energy limits.  Recently I’ve tried out the set-up you see in the picture above and I’m kind of liking it.

Tatiana is a level 47 wizard whose total energy, including 18 points from Beastmaster gear, is 91.  I’m alternating between having her garden full enough to use most of her energy and less full so she has some leftover energy for pet training.

There’s a two-tier, 12-medium-plot patch on the left, a two-tier, 18-small-plot in the middle (as well as one large plot for “liked” plant) and a second two-tier, 12-medium-plot patch on the right.

The whole thing fits in the pest spells and large area spells.  Each individual section also fits within a medium area spell.  This way I can plant only one or two portions of it or the whole thing, depending on what I want to grow (often means, what harvest drops do I need).

The garden in the picture is two sets of 12 Evil Magma Peas, 16 Pink Dandelions planted with one Tiger Lily (for pixie) and one Boom Shroom (liked by EMPs) and a Snap Dragon in the large plot (like for PDs).  The EMPs, and PDs need pollination and water, the Tiger Lily just needs pollination, the Boom Shroom and the EMPs need music, and the lone SD needs magic.  The highest level pest spell needed is rank 2.

So the pest spell takes 10 points*, the three large area spells for needs take 15 points each and the Snap Dragon needs one 3 point spell — total energy use:  58.  Thus, even without the energy gear, she’d have enough energy to care for this combination.

You can see some large plots to the right; that’s a 2-tier 24–large-plot patch for Couch Potatoes.   If that’s planted as well as the stuff on the left she can still do it within her total energy, though without enough left over for pet training.

I’ve also set this one up with Sword Ferns in the far left patch and the rest of it the same.  It means taking the pest spell up to rank 3 but otherwise the same needs spells take care of all of it.  And once I’m less in need of mega snacks, I’ll be alternating it for getting various combinations of reagents from plants with similar needs.

It’s a nice garden for maximizing benefits for a mid-level wizard without ever having to buy energy.

* For my wizards who’ve made it into Zafaria far enough to get the rank 2 48-hour pest spell I’d be using that; 15 points.  You have to complete the early Zafaria quests to get access to the gardening spells so you can’t just port a lower level wizard to someone for that one.