Levelling & Search Comments

Hello chums!

On Sunday a momentus event occured in my FFXI career - for the first time in years and years and years, Samurai once again became my highest levelled job, surpassing Bard which is still at 67. Since I made a full return just over a week ago, I've gone from Samurai 65 - 69. Aside from the 1 - 12 soloing levelling run, this is probably the fastest I have ever levelled!

What's happened?

Back in the old days, I would easily spend hours a week LFG on Samurai without result or interest. Indeed, it was the misery of getting stuck at around level 46 or so that made me quit Samurai for Bard in the first place.

So what's the secret?

I have picked out three factors:

#1: Sheer blind luck. (I think is probably the most important)
#2: Momentum - partying with the same people over a period of time and being remembered. (This is also very important)
#3: A ridiculous search comment.

Now while #1 & #2 are important, they wouldn't make for a good blog. So I'm going to discuss #3. Search comments.

For years, my search comments were very serious and sensible. They might look something like this:

@3000 HP: {Jeuno} {Warp}OK!
SJ: WAR/THF/NIN
JP/EN/EU PT OK! {Please Invite me}

This got maybe got me 1 invite over the course of 25 hours+ lfg.

When me and Dema levelled as a duo on MNK & THF (and later SAM & THF) we used to prominently displayed that we needed to be invited as pair. So the comment might look like:

@3000 HP: {Jeuno}
{Friend}: Demajen 52 THF
{Team up?} Please invite us both!

No one ever, ever, ever read this, ever. So we had invites for one but not both. And then confusion when we pointed this out.

Now, upon returning to FFXI I couldn't remember how to play at all, I had no macros and no idea what I was supposed to be doing or where people XP'd these days. So more in hope than expectation I wrote a comment that stole unmercifully from 'The Producers'. It went like this:

@10000
Don't be silly, be a smarty,
Invite Saikyo to your party!

Since then, the invites have been literally pouring in. It's even reached the point where I have been getting invites when not LFG, something that hasn't happened to me since I quit Bard. Whatever the reasons, I'm attributing it to the awesome search comment!

Of course I am paranoid now that my luck is going to run out and I'll become stuck short of 70. I really want to get to 70 and beat up a humble old man. ^_^d

Till next time!