Can you have too many Black Reavers? Yes, you sure can. Follow me, gentle reader, to an afternoon raid into the City of Mist on last Friday...
We have had repeated difficulty obtaining the castle camp because of it's value to cash farmers. In the era of PoP, this is an easy camp, not the feared stronghold it once was. So, to ensure at least a reasonable crack at a jade reaver for Bianca, we planned on a noontime assault. We also had hired a rogue since we had no firm commitments for any of the guild rogues (being a ?good? guild, we have few enough as it is). We tried not to leave anything to chance. We had a euro time guildie on hand to tank (62 level warrior) and drive-by KEI (he has 62+ enchanter as his alt). We had a 62 Cleric on hand for healing and buffs, so all was good.

We were a bit late in getting there, but had no problem getting the camp, as expected, the zone was all but empty. Still, though, it was a little close, while we were preparing to open the castle, a dual boxer showed up, he wanted to use the castle area to PL a Cleric, but was not interested in Black Reavers.

Yay! The first was hurdle down. Black Reavers are not especially hard for a strong mid 50?s group. We had almost 2 full groups in camp and we handled them pretty well. Since the Rogue was not familiar with the zone, and we had no Monk, I was the puller. This went OK; except for the time I got two Black Reavers on the elevator with me. Well, we do have an epic Cleric?

By 1pm or so, we had cleared the 4 easily reached Black Reavers and had gotten Bianca her Jade Reaver. Our goal for the day was 3 Jade Reavers total though, so we were going to hold the camp for at least one more spawn cycle (2 hours). We pasted the time pulling (training) trash to the throne room. The trash mobs had decent cash, if nothing else. We also got one of the guild Shamans his books from Lord Ghosik. We had a tense few minutes when a Mage pet agroed Lord Rak?Ashir, the Shaman bad assed epic mob. His Rain of Fire effect would kill us all fast. We managed to get the situation calmed down before anyone died, but we had to be careful in the corridor behind the throne room where we left him parked.

During the wait, we also had a rotation of personnel. Add Sparkes (63 Enchanter), Seyah (63 Epic Cleric) and Tinv (65 Rogue), minus Spiritene (our previous Cleric), Willius (the Shaman) and a few others. This turned out to be a useful set of folks when the second set started. Sparkes and Tinv were trying to find a way to agro the back Black Reaver and get it to path to the throne room when the throne room Black Reaver spawned. That was quickly disposed of as well as the pair from the top of the elevator. Though one of those coughed up another Jade reaver, woot! OK, not pretty, but two is better than none, it is 2:45pm. I am thinking we get that last easy Black Reaver on this set and then try to get this group to go kill Faydedar to finish Bianca?s epic. Looked doable, I was going to have to log by 5:00pm to get the kids from daycare and I was not going to be able to be present for another round of spawns.

Nice though and wrong as well. We started fighting the last Reaver in the hallway for some reason. I think Sparky?s DC pet grabbed agro and we just did him there. Then it chain spawned a second. Cool, kind of a bonus. Then a third. Cool, this is fun. Then a ninth, rut roh. The hallway trash is spawning and we are getting adds all over the place. This is where Sparkes shines. He mez parked half a dozen mobs, shrunk a dire-charmed fog golem, gave it two weapons and fed him the mezzed mobs. The main characters could then concentrate on the ever lengthening Reaver chain.

Then we got help from the Dual Boxer. He had gotten inside on one of the player rotations and was working one of the upstairs rooms until the Cleric he was power leveling died. Seyah was willing to rez him once we were done. After 30 minutes of waiting, he came to see what the hell was keeping her.

The chain just kept on going and going. We started making plans to evacuate out if it didn?t end soon. Bianca was the only porter, but several people could gate. We were going to come up one space short, but Tinv could Escape (or just train the zone). So all was set. Then, after the 95th Black Reaver, the chain finally ended. The melee players experienced a severe attack of vertigo as it ended. It was now 5pm, we had been fighting nonstop for over 3 hours. Nonstop. Even in raid mode with the average level of 60, I got 12%. Unbelievable. We killed the DC pet, rezzed the DB Cleric and ported out.

Whew. Bi has we Reaver and all we have to do is fry a punk Kunark dragon to finish off her epic. We also got a Jade Reaver for a friend and one for the guild bank. Everyone was happy but tired.