They gots me a medal <.<

And I don't think I've done a single Campaign Ops this round...

The Lament of DRF (2/5): The "Real" Beginning

I honestly do not remember when DRF was created. All I remember is this:

- I spent the 8k to buy the shell
- It was from the Windurst vendor
- I was hungry at the time
- I was excited
- It was sometime in November

The original idea of this linkshell (which, by the way, did not go as planned at all) was to make a group of 18 players and live off with that. You can do anything with 18, well, almost anything with 18. If I remember, the few original members that stayed from beginning to the end (at least, when I left) was:

Myself
Thelan
Lillie
Yonekura
Homeslizzle
Madsic

And... I honestly think that was it. There were probably one or two more people and I apologize if I forget your name. Doesn't mean I think less of you though. It was, after all, a whole year.

As stated, the original goal was to create an LS of that small size and to rock with it. What eventually happened is that we ended up with players who would not show up to events or could not show up to events. Having 18 people to share a huge time slot was difficult, probably impossible with how today's lives are being ran. The idea soon tore up and a new plan was to be launched.

I think it was when I was sitting in Aht Urhgan Whitegate where I suddenly felt the urge to shout out for members. Probably the most stupidest idea I've ever had thought up of to find members but I really did not have too many options. Oddly enough, I managed to get quite a bit of people. I think more people started joining in on the fun of shouting in Whitegate for LS members. Oddly enough, I didn't get laughed at or flamed at, still not sure why.

So what was the plan? What did I do to get people in on our linkshell of love? We made it into a Sky LS. Too bad there were already 10 other Sky LSes flying around, so why would people be interested in this one? I used a silly tactic which I was really trying to get to work. I made a Contribution Point System, probably the most crappiest thing I've ever created in my entire life. I'll explain why:

The system was to promote fairness by giving players points based on how much time they spent doing Sky events with us. Now, this little concept alone can work pretty well for a linkshell that is motivated enough to do Sky and does only Sky. here is the problem though: There were other events and we had people that had huge disagreements on who should get what items.

I think this alone is what brought down DRF's reputation for a lot of people. We judged people on a item system that was not meant to be used for judging. Why did I agree to this system? Pretty much, I had to or wouldn't have a working administration. I really did think the idea of having to change who gets what based what "we" think of them was bullcrap. Sure, we can hide it as a measure of skill or a measure of how constantly they did events with us or how late or how early they show up to events or how their attitudes were like. We put a lot of concern for this, I can see why we put a lot of concern about it and I honestly can see why I had to try to hide it for so long.

So, that numeric value I had for people? Didn't mean a single thing, at all. We eventually stopped keeping track of this value and for the most part, people didn't seem to care about it, which I can see why because eventually after trying to cover it up so much, it would confuse ANYONE to not even question it. Though the fact that this was completely missing and omitted wasn't the biggest problem that made DRF fall, it was what came from the abuse that took us down a lot of notches.

We tried to bring back this system once or twice before, but it ended up not being used at all, again, due to disagreements and complications.

A question I ask myself constantly: Would DRF be a better place if I had a working point system with no upper management abusing it? I keep telling myself yes and I probably would have lasted a lot longer. I, personally, like to work with solidified stats, with concrete numbers and having things static. When you start trying to factor in who deserves what based on opinion, that is when I don't make the best decisions. I'm really not good at buying gifts for people for birthdays or Christmas either based on their personality, I really need a wish list for that.

There were also some safeguards to that system I created, namely the Wish Lists and the Main Job Priority System.

Honestly, when I think back to these things right now, I want to vomit. It was just a huge mess of trying to please all the sacks and the "important" LS members. Sometimes, I really do wish I was just the one and only leader person and if no one likes what I do, at least I can see quite well that it is my fault and that I can fix it without having to talk to a 2nd or 3rd person.

The Wish List system was pretty simple: Put what you want in your Wish List. Anything. Right now, I can see how bad of an idea it was, but at the same time, that is where the Main Job Priority system would come and fix the day... too bad, the Main Job Priority system (that just sounds so federal) was probably the most unstable thing in the whole system.

Anyways, I'm going to stop going into details about our lotting system. I hate it, I really really hate it. It was twisted in so many directions that we might as well just say that we decided everything.

I honestly hope it was apparent to a lot of people and I'm glad that a few people left the LS when they knew it was happening, left when they did. I agree, it is stupid and abusable and any real fix that I wanted to do would have just ended up being a heated argument and nothing would have gotten done.

Eventually, as time went on, I met a lot of interesting people, made some very interesting alliances and did many interesting things.

Slice/Madsic

The two black Elvaans in my linkshell. The guys were chill, they were there for fun, and while they may not be the best players in the game, at least I can say they had the right attitude going into it. Being around the two, it helped me realize that the game is not all serious gear and playing the game at the absolute best. It was being able to play well without stress and worry. We'll all admit, they made their fair share of mistakes, I made my mistakes, everyone has. In the end, why cry over spilled milk? Especially when this is all just a game and once you cancel your account or sell it or what not, everything you have done will all just be a fragment of your memory, and maybe a few dollars in cash. Slice eventually became a sack.

Liseth

The love of my life. I could sit down and repeat this story as many times as I want but for the sake of this and trying to be fairly unbiased about what I'm posting here, I'll keep it short and maybe I'll decide to give the whole public story later, perhaps in my actual life blog rather than this FFXI blog.

I found Liseth randomly, while walking around in Whitegate. We started chatting, she said she wasn't too satisfied with Aftermath (Are they still around?) so she joined my LS. Eventually was made into a sack. To be honest, keeping this little pepper in control was probably one of the harder tasks to do in the linkshell. "ZOMGS, did Mog just say that about his lady?!" Well, yeah, yes I did. I pretty much had to keep an eye on her and made sure she stayed in our LS. Yes, I was worried she would leave for another LS, every single second that she was in there. Why? Because I knew that DRF could never ever give her what she wants. It isn't about gear whoring or anything like that, it was how open we want the game to be. Liseth did help me strive to bring the best out of our members. I wanted really hard to be able to get to the point where me and her, along with everyone else, can be happy and satisfied with how the LS progressed. This was not a bad thing at all, progress is progress. However, it was very upsetting when part of the sacks... crucified her for what she is trying to improve on in the linkshell.

Yes, I chose some really powerful words there... wooo~ I bet you're thinking "That Mog, he's just sucking up to his lady!" Yeah well, that wasn't all. More on this later.

The KnightsTemplar Sky Truce

Our original schedule for our LS was (Before Sea was introduced into the LS):

Monday: Break
Tuesday: Sky
Wednesday: Break
Thursday: Sky
Friday: Sky
Saturday: Gods
Sunday: Dynamis

Now, you may wonder "Why are Monday and Wednesday break days? It's not balanced at all!" The reasoning was that Pent, the leader of KnightsTemplar and friend, had Sky runs that were going to conflict with us. Rather than going against his LS (on top of many other LSes), we tried to avoid ramming into each other, so we took advantage of their break days or days that they were not going to be in Sky.

Eventually KT broke, we ended up sticking with two break days for quite awhile.

The DRF/CC Vrtra Alliance... AKA "The 10 guests I brought a long because they were bored"

You know, I find it really funny that people would justify not hanging out with people because they "may" have hacked or they "may" have botted. I find it ridiculous and almost shameful when people refuse to do things with other linkshells because that linkshell is a fusion of other linkshells that MIGHT have had 1 or 2 members botting in it.

Did I mention I'm glad I left Cerberus?

However, it was a fun fight, though being up that late at night was a bit demanding for most of our members. Zizka is a great guy though. I hope him and his LS the best of luck in their future endeavors.

Now that I think about it, the fear of drama is probably worse than being tossed in drama.

First Kirin, First Kill

It took about 1:45 if I recall. Eh, I think it is a great time for the first time. Not sure if anything major dropped from it... and not sure who got what from it. I don't recall if Osode dropped on our first run though.

I don't remember anything from it actually... Did I even kite the thing?!

Well, tune in next time where I'll be diving into the meat as to how DRF went from a pretty good LS to be in... into a cesspool of hatred and lies! All from a cuddly Canadian Cat to the departure of perhaps one that could have been the savior of mankind... I mean... the linkshell.

Mog Style: SAM70/WAR35

Tarutaru Samurai: 6 Hit Desperation >.>

Main: Kazaridachi
Sub: Pole Strap
Head: O-Hat
Neck: Chi. Chain
Ear1: Spike
Ear2: Fowling
Body: Haubergeon
Hand: H. Kote
Ring1: Woodsman
Ring2: Rajas
Back: Amemet +1
Waist: Swift
Legs: Shinimusha Haidate
Feet: H. Sune-Ate

I couldn't wait until level 75 to get my 6-Hit TP build setup (which I recall only needs +11 Store TP if you have maxed out Store TP merits), so I sold all of my BRD gear and managed to get myself a pretty decent 6-Hit TP build for my SAM. This puts me at +25 Store TP (going past the required amount of +21 by 4) and allows me to put some WS gear on in place of some Store TP gear for the first hit.

I was very satisfied with the results, though it did take a huge drain out of my pockets. Hopefully I can hit 75 soon with max merits so I can sell back some of this gear.

Hmm... Going to need to get some stuff at Sky... but I really don't feel like going back there, that and I have no time for silly stuff like that now. >:3

The Lament of DRF (1/5): The Beginning

Well, before I start going into the present with how my life in FFXI is right now, I feel the need to let go the past. Best way for me to do that is to write about it. Now that my old LS back in Cerberus broke apart (DownRightFierce), I think I'm more open to write about things, as the only real thing that will happen from this will be fairly insignificant to the point where no one cares. Of course, no one probably would care for what I'll be writing here (and for the next 4 posts after), but I consider this my moment to explain that moment in Cerberus.

==In The Beginning==

The time before I created DownRightFierce was when DynamisLordHNMLS has gone down and a new LS was formed: Thunder. DynamisLordHNMLS (or DL) was a linkshell that was concentrated towards Dynamis. However, it had a problem of trying to do things outside of its own jurisdiction. DL did Sky events, Sea events, and Limbus as well. For the most part, while DL did what it did well, when it came to other things, it became a huge mess. This was not a lack of skill but rather a lack of an understanding of how the linkshell was meant to be ran. As stated, DL was meant for Dynamis and was known as a Dynamis linkshell. However, when it started to reward players for doing Sky events or Sea events and so on, that is where the floodgates began to overflow. When players expect to join a dynamis LS, most expect to join a LS where they spend 3-4 hours out of two days to do Dynamis and thats it, no catches or anything.

Eventually, the linkshell leader lost interest, mainly for the reason that he was most likely overwhelmed by the crap he caused and had other things that he feels is better to focus on. I can't blame him, with all the things that did happen, I don't care if playing WoW is the excuse to leave and quit. If a person needs to get out, they need to get out and while there are many people who can't respect that, I, at least, do.

To this day I still respect the leader of DL. Sometimes, you just want to just sit down, play the game and have fun with it and not give a crap about what items fell to you and so on. I kept this mentality going (for the most part) throughout most of my end game career (and I still do now as a social player). But at the same time, you have people that need tending to when you're the leader. Sometimes, you will just break under pressure and end up tripping all over yourself, regretting making decisions and often times, not able to retreat those decisions. This was probably one of my bigger problems in running DownRightFierce. I made a lot of bad decisions and held a lot of regrets.

We all treat the word regret as a way to say that we made a bad decision and therefore, we look back upon it in a rather negative way. Sometimes, you hold regret in two directions, where you soon realize no matter what decision you pick, it will both end up in an equally bad situation. That's one situation you just don't want to be in your life but it happens all the time.

DL, while having many great memories (along with bad ones) in it, was not the main influence in why I decided to step up to the plate and create DownRightFierce. DL rewarded me with great ideas, but it was the various situations of what I have encountered in both DL and Thunder.

You see, at this time, I was bored with the game. When you lose your main LSes, it kinda happens unless you can find another LS. There were no LSes that I believed would have worked for me after the end of Thunder. I was also sickened at the progress of Cerberus. At the time, server transfers were not introduced, so I was generally stuck with what I had at Cerberus. Cerberus just felt like it was many years behind, which had many reasons behind it really. I do believe the general populous of Cerberus are too lax, too family based, too afraid to step out of that box. I do complement one linkshell to this day though that is actually trying to do something for the people that just don't want to join WhirlingWind or KoN(Now Progeny), that LS being CaptainCaveman. I think out of all the linkshells I've seen in Carbuncle thus far, I can tie it more towards CaptainCaveman than any other LS. Do I think CC is doing better than WhirlingWind or KoN? I can't say because they are of a different caliber.

I really don't have too much to say about Thunder. The reason being is because Thunder, in the long run, did not accomplish too much that I would really say is worth talking about. It isn't to say Thunder was a bad LS, it was more or less the same thing as DL but with less emphasis on Dynamis. It did lack a clear system of what to expect in terms of items. It made it difficult to keep attention of the players as well. All in all, there really isn't much to say about the LS, except after when the LS broke apart.

One night, after the leader of Thunder announced his leave of the game, I was leveling up my WAR while on TeamSpeak with Eugene, Lillie, and Thelan. I don't remember the conversation all that well but all I know is that I said something along the lines of giving people their Haidates and working hard enough to get a full Kirin set. I guess I was angry at the time. RMT were ravaging Sky, the added competition from all the linkshells that were starting just made things harder, and keeping people interested in trying to attempt Sky again and again just made things almost impossible. Did I really keep my words and do what I intended to do?

I knew one thing for sure though, eventually later that week, I was discussing what to name the LS with Thelan and what color the pearl should be. DownRightFierce, in a blue "chi" like color. What was the goal of the LS?

Most importantly, where was I going with this idea and what did I want to achieve?

The only thing I had in my mind was "I was going to make a small linkshell that will be so great."

Was it that great?

Find out next time. >.>

Grand Opening! @_@

Hello and welcome to MogKnight's FFXI blog. Here, you will find blog posts relating to the ever on-going adventures of Mogknight from the server "Carbuncle."

For the most part, this blog will only relate to FFXI related material. For a bit of Mog's real life adventures, you may check the blog entitled "MogKnight's Slice of Life" located the right side of the blog.

Today's entry will be short since I am doing this all at like 1-2 in the morning so, I'll go with a quick introduction.



This is Mogknight. Tarutaru, Windurstian, PLD/BRD/WAR all leveled to 75, SAM currently at 68. Originally from the server "Cerberus," Mogknight has been in various linkshells including DynamisLordHNMLS, YourFantasy, and I have created my own Linkshell named "DownRightFierce." After my girlfriend Liseth (which you can also find the link to her blog on the right) moved to Carbuncle and deciding to devote more time into my studies, I have left the end game circle in Cerberus and started a social take of the game on Carbuncle. Currently, I am in the linkshell "ProphecyReborn" while doing dynamis with "NoLimit."

Well, there is your small quick introduction. @_@ Until next time~