With Paxmortis recently returned from infecting the West Coast of the USA, and Fugg, Blackheathen and Stroeb spoiling for a fight, the team gathered for a crack at the second half of Maraudon - mainly for the drops, but also to get the teamwork cranking again. We were going in without Neitzsche, our Healer extraordinaire, so loaded up on pots and bandages before dropping in Desolace.

As ever, Fugg & Blackheathen led us on unerringly, and before long we were deep in the festering caverns. Being Priestless made it a tricky errand, but we managed to move pretty smoothly through the various foes on offer. Pax seemed to be slightly overcome by jetlag, but we pushed him on - perhaps a little to hard, as it turned out.

Our first boss, Tinkerer Gizlock, put up a typically Goblinish fight, but went down without too much effort. Alas Blackie was already armed with his Megashot Rifle drop - but Pax was on hand to DE it into a nice shard for some lucky enchantree.

It was at this point that things started to turn a little hairy. On the run back out, Pax managed to not manage to thread the needle between a mob of Subterranean Diemetradon. NP, as the rest came to his aid. But shortly after it happened again, and Pax went down for the count. It’s a looooong run back when the jumper cables fail!

Pax wonders how he can pull all those Dinosaurs when we least expect it

We ventured on, moving toward the next boss, Landslide. On the way, Blackie carefully positioned us to take down a patrolling Shadowshard Smasher squad with a warning not to accidentally back into the dino mob behind. Which Pax, by now predictably, unerringly did! Somehow we all managed to survive that hiccup, only to have the patrol respawn right on top of us. This was the final straw for Fugg, Pax and Stroeb, all who went down. But magically Blackie managed to stay up, with a brilliant use of the last resort Goblin Sapper Charge FTW! For those not familiar - the GSC explodes dealing up to 750 damage to all nearby, including the person who sets it off…

We all knuckled down after that episode, Fugg and (newly Combat Sword specced) Stroeb DPSing for their life, and picked up the eminently DE-able Fist of Stone from Landslide, before Stroeb collected the very handy Blackstone Ring off the lovely Princess Theradras and even handier Albino Crocscale Boots from Rotgrip.

The Elder get vengeance for all those dead Yank tourists in the Top End

So another dungeon down, with no wipes but a lot of entertaining pulls from Pax. But we shouldn’t be too hard on him - jetlag is a killer. Literally.