Somnia Online, K.T. Hanna [best books to read now .txt] 📗

for the next time she’d need to make sure they potioned up to give themselves the best possible chance.

Why didn’t the damned mobs seem to get a diminishing returns notification? That wasn’t balanced at all. And this wasn’t even the ability that required them to hide behind the damned pillars.

She took a split second to recognize that she was getting flustered. That wasn’t going to do any of them any good. She turned her attention to observation, trying to catalogue everything they were learning as they went.

The boss was based on a hippopotamus. He was huge, sort of bulbous, with a huge mouth and giant teeth that decorated the inside. However, his massive feet had clawed paws on the ends of them, more like a crocodile than a hippo, and the horn on its head resembled that of a rhinoceros if rhinoceroses had horns with dripping poison.

Seven people were already dead, and he sat at sixty percent life, like he wasn’t about to go anywhere and only wanted to dig his feet in more. He was definitely an angry hippo. Not hungry…probably hangry. She would be if she were stuck on this tiny damned sand island. Although if he was based on a hippopotamus, then he should be able to swim out without a problem, but that was being too realistic.

She wanted there to be an easier way to solve this boss, but there didn’t seem to be. Merlin was down, leaving Exbo to wrangle the rangers himself. Both Ishwa and Dalvin, the mages from Exodus had been thrown against the pillars as they tried to run to hide behind them, and they were down two of their five healers, one of them being Veranol. Not having the defiler there to cast wards on people definitely showed in the amount of damage being delivered to the raid members.

Devlish struggled to hold his own against the massive blows the beast hammered into him. All in all, this fight was a pain in the ass. Risk was dead, and Rashlyn died too. And even as Murmur began to recast her slow that, of course, had diminishing returns as well, she could see the beast bringing his foot down on the Spiral bard Ivinel.

It seemed like its limbs could draw people to them like a magnet. She needed time to go through the combat logs and figure out the damned thing’s special abilities. Eight members down, only twenty-two of them left, and she could have sworn the damned thing’s life just ticked back up to sixty-two percent. They needed to wipe it and start again, armed with better knowledge.

“Wipe it!” She made the call, and the wave of relief that rippled through her sensing net toward her helped reinforce it to be the right decision.

Sinister grumbled as she backed up next to her. “Seriously hate dying, and this damned thing doesn’t improve it.”

She tapped her headset and turned away from Murmur, as the enchanter did the same. Something about watching each other die was most unpleasant. Thought it didn’t take long, because the damned beast had so many different abilities that could crush a character who wasn’t trying to survive.

Deafening Stench Roar hits you for 700 damage.

Cascade of Death hits you for 483 damage.

You have died.

You have been slain by Hipnormous.

You will respawn in 12 seconds at a safe zone within reach.

Murmur blinked, groaning in pain as she rematerialized at the beginning of the dungeon. Her body ached from the stomping she’d received, like all the bones were trying to click back into place.

All around her, the raiders were picking themselves up, dusting off, checking stores and beginning personal buffs. There was no dejection she could find in any of them, instead a renewed vigor to rally together now they knew more about the creature. Nothing would taste as sweet as victory…provided the boss didn’t stink as much in death as he did using that damned stench skill.

With everyone resurrected, Murmur pushed the lingering pain against her skull to the back of her mind. She didn’t have time to dwell on the ghost pain from her death even if it made moving distinctly uncomfortable. Instead, she began her own round of buffs, making everyone got their correct speed buff, and that all the right people got more agility, not to mention this time, she actually gave Devlish her aggro-holding buff this time. Good old level twenty-five spell to the rescue.

Enrage

Cast: Self or Others

Type: Buff…Sort Of

Duration: 15 minutes

Effect: This buff will cause your target to receive some of the aggression generated by you. The mob will assume it comes from the target of this spell. This spell is intended for tank types or pets to take on. Only cast it on someone else if you really, really don’t like them, or maybe if you’re running for your life. Also—this can only be cast on one target at a time.

She rarely used it because Devlish rarely needed the help, and sometimes the ability could backfire, but Hippo down there was a one-meatshield fight. Their tanks didn’t need to swap aggro on the boss for any reason. Off tanks were only needed for the one wave of adds they’d seen so far. At least now they knew they were coming, anyway. All in all, that first group of three had totally startled Rashlyn.

Then, while everyone was still gathering themselves, she went through the combat log, seeking out maximum damage performed by the beast, the timing between stomps, and if there was a type of trigger for his abilities. The only thing she could be certain of was that the latter wasn’t based on health percentages. From what she could tell, it was time elapsed since Hippo was engaged.

She could work with that.

“Okay, everyone. Buff up. You know the drill.” The thrill of raiding through trial and error was such a rush. Murmur loved it. Learn, wipe, progress. Learn, wipe, progress. There was such a sense of accomplishment in knowing that you’d figured out something no one