City of RL Endurance Drop

So I’ve been planning for Honeygun’s return for a while now. A while longer than I’d planned, if that made sense. But recently I started doing stuff with her new self, Taste of Honey, and Margie’s “companion” charcacter, Ebon Maze, on a casual basis.
Then the suggestion came up of doing the Transcendence Trial this weekend (before I5 hits). And it was suddenly, horribly, blindingly clear that Honey must do that. It was the obsession that had driven her to extremes, that had gotten her into trouble, turned her into a Dark/Dark Defender, and now (it was obvious) she needed to do this to reach personal completion — and maybe even get her a bit out of the trouble she was in.
So this past week became Get Taste of Honey Up in Levels Week. She was at 9. Over the course of the week, we managed to get her up to 12 — barely enough for the trial, but …
Friday night would be the big push. Then Margie suggested that we should do Positron. We could duo it, get Big Prizes, and get Honey up into comfortable level range for the Trial, which schedules had pieced together for Saturday.
Well, it was a great plan, and would have been still better if we’d managed to get started before 8:30p. At that, it was great fun. Margie brought along Kazima, who would be doing the Trial, so as to get back used to her. Positron takes three to begin, so Margie was recommended to Lady Photon as a starter, which was fine, since she’s always fun. We just got started kind of late.
Lady P ended up rejoining us on the second mish, and ran through to the very end. It all went great, aside from wrapping around 4 a.m., and at the end of it, Honey was at 15, the top level for the Trail. W007! Perfect!
Too perfect, as it ended up.
I made a few intentional design decisions with Honey as we proceeded. I’d decided a while back on Recall Friend, but as I played with Stealth, and thought of the Trial, I realized that Invis was a must for the tunnels. So that’s what I took for 14, rather than a travel power. Hated life, but I knew …
Margie did all the leg work and organization for the Trial, since I was (a) the Mystery Guest, and (b) not in the CoJ, and thus not in SG or Coalition Chat.
It was a faboo group — Honey and Kazima, Hyperthermian, Synoptic, Kinetica, Dubh Bas, Mal Bot 2300, Shock Therapy. And the Trial went flawlessly (once we shuffled players to actually have someone along who *had* the mission, which is why we ended up with a Malbot). Honey’s powers were perfect. I scouted the Troll Caverns (since I didn’t have the map any more) on Invis beforehand, and went straight to the Trial entrance to bring the group to her (as soon as she remembered to drop Invis). BD’s Dubh Bas — another Dark/Dark — also had RF, so he was able to help with gathers.
We went in, we cleared out the main floor by the numbers — Hyperthermian at the center, everyone else blasting/punching/slicing away. Then Honey started Invising into each tunnel, RFing folks to obelisks, etc. In the two cases where there were CoT right at the Obelisk, I brought Hype in to clear them out.
Two tries to click the Obs simultaneously, and we were on our way.
Prepped outside of Koaga’s door, then charged in in and knocked him on his ass in under 30 seconds. Piece o’ cake.
Only two regrets from the whole shindig:

1. No time for RP with Honey. Folks were mostly concerned with the mechanics of the mission (understandable) and Honey was key to the mechanics thereof and doing a lot of running around. And I hadn’t had as much time to do the player/campaign prep as would have been ideal, either, so most of the players on the team weren’t in tune to what was going on (and I’d inadvertently spoiled the surprise for BD earlier in the week). So the RP for her was perforce limited. Still got a bit in — tearful eyes, and the like — but a lot less than I’d been hoping for.
2. Stupid auto-exemp bug! Stupid, stupid, stupid. Level 15? Sorry, no XP for you! Good thing both doing the trial and getting the badge were important for Honey, because she got jack-all for it (which, to be fair, was true for most of the player). Still, felt somehow … cheated, since it was a bug. Rrg.

Still, again, it was perfect. Already talk of doing it again with a bit different set of character and/or players, though I’m not sure Honey will want to go through that again.
Got Kitten down to bed after that, then played a bit more, but I found myself nodding off around 10:30p (having had to get up around 7:30a for Kitten), and bailed out early.
So, where now for Honey?
Oddly enough, I was complaining after the Trial to Margie that I was finding her power set annoying — having to hit for a Heal is a PitA. On the other hand, as I was running Psi-clone later, I found myuself missing Tar Patch and Recall Friend, so maybe it’s not so bad.
The Invis is great, and, even I5-nerfed, will be helpful for her. That means waiting for another full level to 16 for a travel power — and it’s a power I didn’t originally have slotted for her. So not sure what’s going to happen there.
Also need to think about pairings. Honey and Kazima work well together, but that leaves Torchielle out in the cold again. Margie’s ambivalent about Ebon, not sure what’s going to go on with him.
But at least Honey’s back in the game. Now I just need to write up some stuff for her — a *lot* of stuff — and maybe get some folks involved in that.
But no more Positron at 8:30p. That’s just crazy. 🙂