The Night Before The Raven

Twas the night before The Raven, when all through the house

Not a peripheral was stirring, not even my mouse.

The Mystery Bags were hung by the chimney with care,

In hopes that Stamina Refills soon would be there.

The Yakusa were nestled all snug in their beds,

While visions of Bloody Knuckles danced in their heads.

And mamma with her Master Chief, and I in my Skull Cap,

Had just settled our brains for a long Mafia War’s nap.

Sorry... this feels like a fairy tale from the Brother's Grimm... and I mean the original book version... not the cutsie cartoon version!

Tomorrow the Raven will appear "sometime" should I choose to go fighting... I have tried several Serial Level test runs... and think that I am now ready to try and defeat this beast without wasting a single unit of Stamina searching for a Sniper Shot!!

Here are all of the things that I have done to be ready for battle:

• Sent out Blue Mystery Bags to my entire mafia (using the Chrome Extension FGS) asking that they send one back in return.
• I have 6 Stamina Packs in my ZMC (Zynga Message Center) just in case I try and open one too early or any have expired.
• Accepted all gifts that are not Mystery Bags, Brazil Crew Requests, or Stamina Packs.

Here are the things I have not done today... or at least in the last 12 hours:

• Brazil crew slots are empty, 10 people wait to be added.
• I have not collected the Brazil properties since this morning
• It has been more than 24 hours since I used my last energy pack.
• I have not even visited the Marketplace so no Fight Club Energy Refill was used.
• I did not visit Atlantic City today.
• I did not open my e-mail bonus.
• I did not post for help with any jobs.
• I did not open a single mystery bag.

Soooo... now I am ready... I will post my game plan in the morning... as you can tell from the above list... Some options are solid full refills... some are small energy or stamina adds... some are dice rolls trying to get refills.

I have the house to myself all day... and except for puppy piddle duty I am ready to serial level and battle my best to not use a single RP or combo to defeat this goon!!!

What tips and tricks do you have to make it through the session with a Raven body in hand?

PS - If I had found more than 4 Sniper Shots per 10,000 stamina I honestly wouldn't have gone to all this trouble to avoid RP... but if you make me use every bit of time for 8 solid hours just searching for parts to TRY and play... I'll change from Checkers to Chess... not a problem!! The 3-D board is 10 ft away... we can go THERE too! This is supposed to be a game and a challenge... not an 8 hour job for a year for a single skill point. /rant

obtaining ruby level loot is a joke

I don't know what kind of luck you guys are having, but I still have only one Firefly.

I don't have a ton of energy, so I only had one level of Brazil ruby mastered, and the others are nowhere close to ruby level. 2-3 ruby level jobs per level and that's it.

Yuck-o. That's what I say.


How many ruby level loot items do you have?

updated top loot charts by MwG

Now that we have so many new items and newly-giftable items, you may have been wondering what the top loot is. The Mafia Wars Gods page has posted several updated charts for your reference. As usual, the person who made these did great work!

{shown above}

• Best of Operations
• Best of Jobs and Fights
• Best of Jobs, Fights, and Fight Club
• Best of Jobs, Fights, Fight Club, and War loot
• Best of Jobs, Fights, Fight Club, Wars, and Operations
• Best with Brazil Ruby Level Loot

loot updates

Barn Owl (51/98)

Bolt Pistol (100/46)

Climber Leggings (50/85)

Hang Man (86/48)

The Mafia Wars blog has posted another update about loot updates, listing new fight loot, which most of us already know about. It also mentions the Brazil 'ruby level loot', of which I still only have one item.

Of more interest to me was this blurb, citing the number of loots that were made giftable the other night. I knew there were TONS, because it took me several screen shots to show it all, but I never stopped and counted. So 'over 340' items were made giftable, according to the official blog!

Old Items Made Giftable
Over 340 previously non-giftable, non-unique items with attack or defense of 65 or less can now be sent to members of your Mafia via your Inventory!

This and Next Week

The This & Next Week post is out from the Mafia Wars blog. As usual, I'm more interested in what's coming next week than what's already happened. After last week, I get the feeling that the list of items coming next week is rather skimpier than what's actually on their scheduled. 

• New Mission Event: Ties That Bind
You’re taking on a newly-elected state governor in Brazil. Keep your head down and power through a major smear campaign to earn a Glamour Helmet (62/150

The Ties That Bind mission event was originally listed last week, I think, but has been rescheduled for this week. Likely this is simply due to the fact that the other mission event won't end until Monday.

• Family Chat 2.0
New features are on the way, including in-chat family member player updates and popping up the chat window.

Now this is something that's long overdue, and I'm glad to finally see it's coming very soon. Several of the people who beta tested the Family module have suggested some improvements to the Family Chat. I wonder if they mean "pop out" the chat window.  

• Collector's Edition Item: Daylight Savings
Never lose another hour of your life again.

So there's "a" limited edition item coming this week, for the collectors. 

From the Mafia Wars Fan Page. ENJOY your free daily point!!

Get extra protection on your side with a FREE DEFENSE point!

http://zyn.ga/7Gy -- Claim your FREE DEFENSE point!

Ruby Run - Search for the Loot

I took 24 hours of time off waiting for the last Mega Casino collection and used all of the available Energy Packs, Mystery Bags, and Property Collections to string together 8 levels of hunting for the "Ruby Level Loot" all around Brazil.

I am still lounging around the Copacabana at the Gold level... but all of the other Districts are solid Ruby. I hit either the highest Energy using job in each level or one that required a consumable.

I only visited Centro at the end of my Energy fill and would love to know if someone who only has this first level at Ruby gets better drop rates for this Special Event.

It took 13,000 energy before I found my first Firefly... and then I got another one on the very next click! While 2 other items did drop in the next 2 times that I leveled I ended up using 26,480 energy for just these 4 !!!

Here is a look at the actual Loot drops:

Twice I was almost out of energy and close to leveling... the middle time I was almost full of energy, and in the middle of a level... hardly enough to be scientific about any kind of a trend!

I did get a lot of good information for some thoughts on Cereal Leveling with Jobs and Robs and will try to string together another 8 level run tomorrow before my Raven window opens.

How are you finding the drop rates in Brazil during this event? Feel like another Big Energy / High Roller activity?

found: the Raven

 

Holy crap, I actually found the Raven! Coincidentally, this was the first time I went to my fight list after being out of the game for a few hours. I didn't ice anyone or even attack anyone. Now the burning question is, do I even wanna? By all accounts, drop rates of the required ammo are worse than the frequency of actually finding the boss fight :-/

And if I don't beat him in 8 hours, he disappears for at least 3 more days. What a crock.

limited edition item: Mars 2000

Looks like they're doing another limited time item in the marketplace, and you'll also see it on your Mafia Wars home page. It's the Mars 2000, with stats of (128,68). It costs 35 reward points, and there's only a little over 3,000 of them left.

Stamina Pack FAQ

Stamina with a Twist and Shout

Instant Increase = Careful Opening

Be very careful how you plow through your gifts... the stamina pack refills the meter as soon as you open them... Use FGS / JGrabAll / or other click savers at your own risk.

Your first warning might come in the Facebook gift area:

Or if you first notice it in the ZMC (Zynga Message Center):

Once you click "Accept Gift:

Your stamina will be filled to the top... but no extra.

There is a 16 hour timer... but not a visible timer... just an internal clock. If you accept another one too early it will turn to a Mystery Boost...

Spreading the Love

As soon as you enter the game you will see them on the free gift page waiting to share stamina happiness throughout your family...

This is a limited time gift with no announced end date. Time to send send send and ice ice ice!

The Raven and Get{DIS}Satisfaction

About a month ago, during the first visitation from the Raven, I started a Getsatisfaction.com thread suggesting that Zynga should increase the appearances of the Raven. Even today, this thread has had some action, yet within the last little while it has been "archived" by Cerulean Master, and now directs you to a new, similar thread that was started. Thanks a lot CM, so now Zynga's just going to disregard all those Likes and Me Too's?? I still haven't seen the Raven, so I think my thread is still relevant.

Nevertheless, the "new" thread does address a different issue about the Raven but is still quite relevant and the feedback contains the same damn complaints. You can find the thread and participate HERE, and I suggest you do so. Zynga seems to be ram-rodding the difficulty level as a planned intent, "oh it's supposed to be 'challenging'", despite player complaints about the Raven both last month and now.

How much clearer can this be spelled out? WE DO NOT LIKE HOW YOU'RE DOING THIS EVENT.

new giftable loot

Wow, I JUST ran Inventory History a little while ago, and then the very next time I looked at the fan page, Feature Contributor Mike Shay had already sniffed out the new loot :D Check out all this loot that is giftable now! This is awesome! Mike says it's everything under 65 attack or defense. I'll have to take a few minutes to look at all this!

T-shirt Design Contest

If you haven't already heard about the T-shirt design contest, you will soon! There is now a blurb about it on the Mafia Wars home page banner. Clicking 'Learn More' will take you to the Mafia Wars blog post about the contest, including information and some graphics that you can use in your design.

Be sure to read the rules! You're limited to only one entry, and of course your entry needs to be appropriate for a general audience.

Ruby Level Loot finally makes an appearance

Ruby Level Loot is here, apparently for the next 8 days. You will need to achieve ruby level mastery of all jobs in "a" Brazil district to find 'exclusive loot'. Once Ruby level is attained, rare gems will start dropping from those ruby level jobs. Or at least, that's what it says.

 

I've gotten the Firefly so far, but this event will sort of suck for me because Recife is the only one I have ruby mastered and the other districts aren't even close :-/

Here are all of the items that have been added.

Brazil Limited Ruby Loot

Just as the title indicates there are 7 new Loot that drops from doing Brazil jobs at Ruby level. You can find the main from your Mission bar as the screenshot shows it is for a limited time, until July 22 (which kinda sucks in my opinion).

Not much else to say but good luck at trying to max out on these since the energy costs at Ruby is so high and 2x loot drops will not be enabled for these 7 loot items (again I think sucks).