Ranger Archive
Thread: Gotta love that big bird... [long]
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Almagill
Sun Oct 24, 2004 8:53 pm
#1
Popped up to Naboo a couple of days back on business and somebody mentioned that wooly is good just now and there's a few folk paying well for it. So, figuring that I do like Naboo, wooly drops off pretty easy prey and I could spend an hour or two plinking 'lamas for fune and profit, I headed off out of town, a couple of lair missions as starters tucked away in my datapad.
First thing I noticed was the lag. It's incredible. Even on relatively unoccupied sections I was warping if I tried biking it. Citing the Ranger mantra of "No probs mate, I can hack it" I got off and walked.
The lairs went over pretty easily, but the harvests were sucky. 22 units off a fat and healthy 'lama? OK, I might be misremembering, but am sure I used to get a LOT more than that. Citing that other well known Ranger saying "Oh well, am here now, and anyway it's weapons XP as well..." I carried on plinking.
Up on the western ridge I found a nice cluster of peko peko and they were a wee bit more rewarding, but not much. For the most part spawns were pretty well spread out and, after an hours steady graft I had.... 1k hide.
I toddled across to the north shore, found myself a nice bit of beach, dropped a spare house as I was going to transfer some gear between characters and didn't think, with the lag, that I could thole the rubberband trek across the plains. Logged for the night citing that well known Ranger phrase "It'll be a lot better tomorrow when the server comes up".
OK, some RL stuff got in the way of being there at server up, but this evening I headed out and mashed my way thru pekos, ordinary and giants, wild spawn after wild spawn of 'lamas and a couple of fambaa packs. Two hours later I was ready to log and on checking found I had.... 2k of hide.
The lag was as bad today as last night. The delay on bringing up the radial was insane, and even using the command line still took a good chunk of time. Normally I will work a lair, slaughter the 1st wave, then target and /harve hide my way round the field. It was taking forever to get that system message 'you have harvested 23 units of hide. The creature was fat and healthy"
Still, I muttered that ol' Ranger phrase "Heck, its not like I was doing anything more important" and started heading back to the lodge to drop my harvest.
I was still areatracking as I went, and bingo, 200m away, a peko peko albatross. 450m away another one!!
I yelled "Yippeee" and went charging off after the closest one. Scared the living daylights out of the folk in my sittingroom, I can tell you.
It moved. It moved FAST. I /ar'd and I found it again. It moved. I tracked. This went on for half an hour and I ended up not knowing what direction I was travelling in. Or where I was for sure. But eventually I caught on to the rough 'pattern' it was flying and headed across to intercept it near the big harvester farms.
OK, so I've seen them on TC, and I've downed one on TC-Bria. But this was Live and with my regualr toon and, boy, was that bird a biggy!!!
I walked along underneath if tor a good ten minutes, taking screenies, doing /exams and trying to buck the courage up to try shooting at it....
...hey, I knew it'd kill me like >< that, but wow... a PPA.
I dig out the best rifle I had for the job, got to a good position, waited till it was in ranger and spammed Mind and Headshots at it and, yep, 5s later i was dead on my back and headed for the cloner.
A little later myself, the doc, a friend and three droids were stood on the beach, buffed (tho, to be honest not suited) lobbing traps, specials, poisons and abuse at the big freak. I was the first to get incapped (oh surprise surprise, all that choice and it went for the cammoed ranger who was furthest away) and lay there watching the doc fling poo and the scout bounce about onthe beach like a stunned fish. That must of lasted all of two minutes before we were all ready for the clone express.
Last thing to die was my LE droid. Little stickman droid shadowboxing his way along the beach 
)
)We did a grand total of 3k damage to its 95k HAM. But it WAS sick and bleeding bad when we left. Yup, at the rate it was bleeding it'll die sometime round about noon tomorrow, lol.
And you know the best thing?
That was the most FUN we've had ingame in weeks!!!
lammergeier
Sun Oct 24, 2004 11:10 pm
#2
them birds is big and nasty.
I remember the first time I solo'd one... as a BioE... a year ago. I think that DNA was lost, like many of the things I used to have on Live.
since then, I've seen them on the glorious server once known as TC... seen them solo'd by correspondents trying to prove the limits of unbuffed combat, seen them hunted by groups when the wooly hide or avian meat was good on naboo, and even dragged them into player cities to watch the mayhem.
they're BIG. they move FAST. area combo is nasty.
I'd wish they were less rare... but that might make them less fun.
three cheers for the peko peko albatross.
I remember the first time I solo'd one... as a BioE... a year ago. I think that DNA was lost, like many of the things I used to have on Live.
since then, I've seen them on the glorious server once known as TC... seen them solo'd by correspondents trying to prove the limits of unbuffed combat, seen them hunted by groups when the wooly hide or avian meat was good on naboo, and even dragged them into player cities to watch the mayhem.
they're BIG. they move FAST. area combo is nasty.
I'd wish they were less rare... but that might make them less fun.
three cheers for the peko peko albatross.
SkunkDuster
Mon Oct 25, 2004 12:18 pm
#4
I think something changed with the movement patterns of the albatrosses in the last patch. Before the patch, they would hover for a bit, then maybe move 50-100M before stopping. All the while staying within a 100M radius or so. I was hunting them with conceal shot the other day and they are flying far and fast now. The last few I killed ended up moving 600-700M away from the point I found them before I was able to bring them down. The hunt goes like concealshot*20, mount speeder, chase chase chase, dismount, concealshot*20, rinse, repeat. It is a lot more running around, but still one of the most enjoyable kills in the game.
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