Lundi, day 84 of Autumn, 552.

This evening at sunset, 25 exiles gathered to attack the Pitch Caves. We traveled quickly, and were camped outside the Pitch Cave within 80 minutes of leaving the Meadow, including a couple of breaks (waiting for an immobile exile in Foothills, a breather at Camp Dred, a backspawn in Malachite Cave 2 that caught a couple folks before they got into Cave 3). We are definitely getting the hang of getting out here quickly and efficiently, but little things will always come up in any group of such size.

The initial entry into the first Pitch cave was rough, but after a couple of sallies the Southern pits were both finally Zu'ed off. We set out to clear the cave, and were doing pretty well, having set a rod South and advanced all the way to the East for luring from Cave 2, when a nasty backspawn of Crimson Arachnoids caught us while we were already fighting two lured Crimsons from Cave 2. Many many folks died right where they were standing. I was very lucky to not be one of them, because I was already ensnared in webs from one Crimson we had just killed. Other fallens blocked me enough from attack so I finally got free of the webs and ran for the West exit. I really hate that after getting free of visible webs, it still takes several painfully long moments to "speed up" back to normal running speed!

Once I did get free, I saw that the exit was blocked already with webs sent flying after the faster retreating exiles, so I and several others ran circles waiting for webs to disperse. I did manage to grab a couple fallens while running, only to have them finally stripped from my chain near the exit. We did recover fallens, but never momentum from that point. We simply took too long.

On today's trip we had excellent Mystic cooperation, with both Lundar and Hepta along.

Hepta proved her worth when she gave the fighters solid Atkus boosts before rushing in to face two Pitch Noids during our initial cave clearing. With that extra accuracy, neither Pitch Arachnoid lasted very long, despite webs ensnaring and slowing fighters and their pulls to try to escape being surrounded. Boosting is a great asset here, and quickly surrounding a Pitch Noid and being able to hit it consistently can make short work of them.

Lundar did spend some time examining the Malachite caves for illusions (and I scanned for advanced paths) on our way out. We were hoping to get him scanning the Pitch Caverns, but it simply didn't stay under control in there long enough this time to let us advance. "Soon".

As usual, after the Crimson backspawn prevented anyone from attending the pit Zu walls so that they died back, the expedition degenerated into rescue practice for the stronger runners and chainers.

Can't stress this enough though: If you are chaining fallens in the Pitch Caves, if you get greedy, you'll get no one. Every time someone tries to be the chaining superphenom there, they eventually get a web throw at them or their chainees, and most or all the fallens get dropped off the chain. Wasted trip. Noids 1, exiles 0.

That being said, I saw some really excellent chaining results, like this one from Natas.

Click here to go back the Foothill trip index.

Click here to go back to Azriel's Main scroll.