You may remember a while ago we (Inq) had a little adventure trying to find a spot to use (place) a villa deed. As one of my personal goals in DarkFall is to own a house and run a vendor, I’ve been on the lookout for some time now trying to get a home of my own.

A few days ago someone in Trade chat was selling both a cottage and a house deed for a reasonable price (160k for both), and I figured if I was going to go looking to place some property, having two options is better than one, so I bought the deeds and set out searching villages. After a few days of noting houses with taxes due (once taxes reach a certain level, the owner loses the house if he does not pay up) but not finding any open spots, I was getting a little frustrated. Each time a place would get close to the tax breaking point, the taxes would be paid.

After about four days of serious searching, I started offering both deeds for sale, not wanting to sit on such a large investment without any real gain, and getting a little sick of traveling half of Agon only to come away with nothing. The house deed sold quickly (for 110k), and right after the sale someone in Trade chat was selling a placed house on Rubaiyat for 250k. At this time I had around 120k in my bank just in gold, so I contacted the seller and asked if he was willing to do a gold+items trade, to which he was open to. I was able to sell him most of my regents (about 20k in total at an average price of 3.5g per) plus 145k gold (I had to borrowed 25k from our clan vault).

With the price agreed upon we both headed to a neutral NPC city to do the trade through a middle man. The way a middle man works here is first the seller gives control of his house to the third party, then I give the seller the gold+regs, and finally the middle man turns over control of the house to me once both parties have confirmed the trade is all set. We used Cattboy SiN as the middle man (trusted guy) and everything went smoothly (despite the fact that, technically, we were in warring clans and could attack each other even in the NPC city), although DarkFall being DarkFall I half-expected shenanigans at one point or another and was on-edge for the hour or so it took to get this all done (negotiation, traveling, waiting).

That night I recalled to my new home for the first time to take a look around. Ruby is a desert/Egyptian themed island, and this village is located on the south-west corner, right next to the city of Ul’Sulak currently owned by Macabre. The local mobs are all different from those found in mainland Agon or Yssam, as is the overall feel of the place. Being a desert, visibility is high and resources (herbs, iron, wood) are scarce, and sandstorm are common. The village that my house is a part of is a larger village with 6-8 homes, and some very nice mob spawns nearby, including Children of Khamset that skin for a rare drop used in making Cobra Staffs (high-end caster weapon).

I meet (fought) the locals living out of Ul’Sulak the first night, coming up to their city gates only to find eight of them hopping over the walls to give me a hug. Judging by the length of time it took them to take me down, I gathered that they are not the most fearsome opponents, which is a nice change of pace from our constant encounters with SF/BkS and other high-end groups.

The next night a few Inq members wanted to see the Ruby nightlife (PvP), and so we recalled to my house, (I can invite one guest, who can then recall, and then kick that person and invite another. Not an instant process, but much faster than riding down) all geared up and looking for trouble. The fun/challenging part of PvP’ing in a new area is you don’t know the popular mob spawns, the high traffic areas, or which residence can/will bring out 20 to face your three.

Shortly after riding out of the village, we heard the familiar sounds of casting and fighting among some ruins on a tall plateau, and after we dismounted we crept up to get a better look. What we found was one player farming some mobs, and being new to the scene we wanted to make a good first impression and say hello. After a bit of a fight (the guy was no cupcake) and a short chase, we had him down bleeding in the sand. Yet just as we finished killing him, we began to take magic fire from above, and noticed three other players charging at us. We fought those three for a good length of time, with several mounts dying and more than one close call on our side, but thanks to some good team work and focus fire, eventually all three enemies were reduced to tombstones ready for looting. The loot was decent enough, and we were certainly enjoying our first 30 minutes or so on Ruby.

Some more scouting followed, all uneventful in terms of PvP, until we got to a hamlet to bank our spoils. A bit lighter, we set out for a player city just to take a look, and much to our surprise the city was a bit destroyed and looked to be abandoned. Somewhat disappointed, we rode east until we spotted a solo riding coming straight towards us. Although we intended to set a quick ambush, we did not have the time and instead had to pursue on mounts, jumping off to bow/magic the rider down. As his mount was just about to fall over, a good ten or so riders crested a sand dune and came straight at us. A quick check of guild tags showed us that these were the residence of that ‘empty’ city, so they must have been out on a clan PvE or PvP run. Now as much as we like a good fight, a 3v10 did not seem like very favorable odds, and so we quickly mounted up and tried to flee. Two of us managed to get away, but the third member of our group has a bit too close and got his mount shot out from under him. Much to our surprise, he lasted a good amount of time against the horde, and even managed to down a few mounts before being killed. Perhaps that 3v10 might have been closer than we thought…

Even with one death, it was a good first run on Ruby, and has everyone looking forward to future encounters. Sadly the house itself is not in a great location to place a vendor, so that part is on hold for now. Perhaps at a later point I might trade this house for something more vendor-friendly, but for now the house is a welcome addition to our PvP and PvE options.

(DarkFall-related post disclaimer/reminder. If you click the image link near the top-right of this page and buy a DarkFall account, I get paid 20% of the client cost. If you believe this taints my views and reporting on DarkFall, your opinion is wrong.)