So, I'm closing down this blog.
I've kind of outgrown it and I think it's time to move on.
To Wordpress.
No, seriously. I love Google but I'm not all that impressed with Blogger any more.
If you're still into reading more of what I have to say, you can find me at http://postcardsfromdalaran.wordpress.com. See you there.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Farewell, General
It didn't take us 3 weeks, but downing Mimiron again was a bitch.
We're building up to 25s now. It's a slow process. We have 18 now. Or is it 19? Not quite enough for two teams.
Thanks to 3.2, we're running heroics like crazy. 6 or 7 of us already have their 4-piece Tier 8 bonuses thanks to badge T8.5 helms and chestpieces. So much for Herald of the Titans.
I guess what's important at this point is to get to Algalon. We'll work out the gearing later.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Requiem for a Fallen Hero
In 1983, when Sen. Ninoy Aquino was assassinated, I was 7 years old and didn't understand what it meant. I only knew that my parents were crying and that something very bad had happened.
When the People Power Revolution happened in 1986, I was 10 years old. I didn't understand it either. But my parents were adamant about being in the middle of a very large crowd of people, so I came with them in my bright yellow Ninoy T-shirt and khaki shorts and I prayed aloud with everyone around me, heedless of the danger.
I'm 34 years old now and I understand.
Pres. Corazon Aquino passed away last weekend. She was the housewife-turned-president whose call to action ousted a dictator and restored our freedom. She was Ninoy's widow and a powerful center of opposition to the Marcoses. She became our president - the first legitimately elected president following the dark days of martial law and the Marcos dictatorship.
The many luxuries I enjoy in my life - including the ability to play World of Warcraft - I owe directly to Tita Cory and her martyred husband.
For the freedom to do the things I love, for the freedom to write (badly) about them, for the freedom to choose my own path in life, I am forever grateful.
Sleep well, Tita Cory. We will always love you.
When the People Power Revolution happened in 1986, I was 10 years old. I didn't understand it either. But my parents were adamant about being in the middle of a very large crowd of people, so I came with them in my bright yellow Ninoy T-shirt and khaki shorts and I prayed aloud with everyone around me, heedless of the danger.
I'm 34 years old now and I understand.
Pres. Corazon Aquino passed away last weekend. She was the housewife-turned-president whose call to action ousted a dictator and restored our freedom. She was Ninoy's widow and a powerful center of opposition to the Marcoses. She became our president - the first legitimately elected president following the dark days of martial law and the Marcos dictatorship.
The many luxuries I enjoy in my life - including the ability to play World of Warcraft - I owe directly to Tita Cory and her martyred husband.
For the freedom to do the things I love, for the freedom to write (badly) about them, for the freedom to choose my own path in life, I am forever grateful.
Sleep well, Tita Cory. We will always love you.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
A Picture Worth A Thousand Gold
Three weeks of furious raiding.
Over 1000 gold per person in repairs and consumables.
Two pieces of loot (one token).
And we're still not sure we can get him down again next week.
Over 1000 gold per person in repairs and consumables.
Two pieces of loot (one token).
And we're still not sure we can get him down again next week.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
A Picture Post
Rage On is officially 8/14 in Ulduar as of last weekend; we downed Hodir and Freya on Sunday, and it looks as though the Iron Council is as good as dead in a few days.
As I'm swamped with work and rushing everything to prepare for an upcoming trip abroad, I'll just post some screenies that have been burning holes in my hard drive since last weekend.
There isn't much for a tank to do during the Loatheb fight, so I took a few screenshots. This one was my favorite. We ran two wings of Naxx to start gearing up Barrgrimm (our shiny new 80 warrior) and Liadon (our first recruit on Nagrand).
We defeated two Watchers, which frees them to aid us against Yogg-Saron; here they are watching over Sara.
Here we posed at Freya's Feet. We didn't take one for Hodir. Nobody likes Hodir.
And here are the screenies (well, kind of) to commemorate downing the Keepers.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Nerf QQ
Euripedes over at Critical QQ has a fairly strongly worded post about the upcoming change to the Emblems that drop from heroic 5-mans and raid instances. In case you haven't heard, the existing Emblems of Heroism and Valor will no longer drop; instead, we will be looting the new Emblems of Conquest. Emblems of Conquest can be traded in for Emblems of Valor or Heroism at a rate of 1:1, so we will still be able to purchase the existing Emblem rewards; of course this also means that we will be able to purchase the T8.5 items that are currently only available to Ulduar-25 raiders.
I'm not sitting on a fount of Emblems of Conquest myself. So far I have 6 on my main - 4 from FL+1 kills and 2 from a heroic VoA PUG. The soonest I imagine myself purchasing anything with them is 2 to 3 months from now. I simply have no access to more; unlike most other raiding Guilds, Rage On does not run 25-mans. We PUG anything larger than a 10-man raid.
So yeah, I'm looking forward to getting more Emblems of Conquest.
There's been a lot of talk about how much this move sucks; about how Blizzard is making it too easy for players to get good loot. It's led to a lot of QQ from players currently farming Ulduar about Blizzard cheapening their achievements. And like Euripedes, I wish they'd shut the hell up.
Nothing diminishes their achievements. Nothing.
As a raid leader going through challenging content, I'm actually happy to see this change coming in. I know my little raiding team is ahead of the pack. We're not attempting Yogg-Saron yet, but we're halfway into Ulduar. We have yet to kill a Watcher, but we're working on that. We're not a premier raiding Guild. We're a band of friends who likes raiding together, and we're actually good at what we do, for which we are rewarded amply by the game system.
Most players don't have even that.
Right now I have eleven - yes, just eleven - raiders. Two of them are married to each other. Another two are in a relationship IRL. If either of those couples takes a break from WoW or goes away for a weekend, we have to call off raiding until we can find replacements.
Usually such replacements are, at their best, Naxx-geared. Sometimes not even that. It's a given that they won't be delivering the same output as our regular raiders. Jizal, our lone Retribution Paladin, can put out 3.5k DPS on average. Last weekend we ran with a PUGged Ret Pally who brought 1.8k DPS to the table. Respectable, but not nearly enough what we need for Ulduar.
Because we only run 10-mans, and those on weekends alone, we also can't expect players hungry for new content to come on board. Also, because we're a close-knit community, we have to ensure that new players fit in with the rest of the group. The ability to get along with everyone in our Guild is more important than the level of one's contribution to the raid. We can help with performance issues. We can't help with personality issues.
The remedy is to borrow alts of friends or toons of people who have missed their Guild's scheduled runs - which we do as often as is needed. Again, we can't expect these guys to be geared, or to know how to play their class at a level appropriate for Ulduar.
Allowing these players and characters access to higher level gear gives them a chance to perform at the appropriate levels. It means that Ulduar-geared players can PUG an Emblem-geared player and expect him to deliver results. Better gear doesn't replace skill, of course, or experience - but it does help level the playing field.
I'm looking forward to patch 3.2. Like everyone not farming Ulduar-25, I'm hoping it'll deliver on its promise to make higher end content more accessible to players like me. That's a promise that Blizzard is bending over backwards to keep, and I honestly appreciate it.
I'm not sitting on a fount of Emblems of Conquest myself. So far I have 6 on my main - 4 from FL+1 kills and 2 from a heroic VoA PUG. The soonest I imagine myself purchasing anything with them is 2 to 3 months from now. I simply have no access to more; unlike most other raiding Guilds, Rage On does not run 25-mans. We PUG anything larger than a 10-man raid.
So yeah, I'm looking forward to getting more Emblems of Conquest.
There's been a lot of talk about how much this move sucks; about how Blizzard is making it too easy for players to get good loot. It's led to a lot of QQ from players currently farming Ulduar about Blizzard cheapening their achievements. And like Euripedes, I wish they'd shut the hell up.
Nothing diminishes their achievements. Nothing.
As a raid leader going through challenging content, I'm actually happy to see this change coming in. I know my little raiding team is ahead of the pack. We're not attempting Yogg-Saron yet, but we're halfway into Ulduar. We have yet to kill a Watcher, but we're working on that. We're not a premier raiding Guild. We're a band of friends who likes raiding together, and we're actually good at what we do, for which we are rewarded amply by the game system.
Most players don't have even that.
Right now I have eleven - yes, just eleven - raiders. Two of them are married to each other. Another two are in a relationship IRL. If either of those couples takes a break from WoW or goes away for a weekend, we have to call off raiding until we can find replacements.
Usually such replacements are, at their best, Naxx-geared. Sometimes not even that. It's a given that they won't be delivering the same output as our regular raiders. Jizal, our lone Retribution Paladin, can put out 3.5k DPS on average. Last weekend we ran with a PUGged Ret Pally who brought 1.8k DPS to the table. Respectable, but not nearly enough what we need for Ulduar.
Because we only run 10-mans, and those on weekends alone, we also can't expect players hungry for new content to come on board. Also, because we're a close-knit community, we have to ensure that new players fit in with the rest of the group. The ability to get along with everyone in our Guild is more important than the level of one's contribution to the raid. We can help with performance issues. We can't help with personality issues.
The remedy is to borrow alts of friends or toons of people who have missed their Guild's scheduled runs - which we do as often as is needed. Again, we can't expect these guys to be geared, or to know how to play their class at a level appropriate for Ulduar.
Allowing these players and characters access to higher level gear gives them a chance to perform at the appropriate levels. It means that Ulduar-geared players can PUG an Emblem-geared player and expect him to deliver results. Better gear doesn't replace skill, of course, or experience - but it does help level the playing field.
I'm looking forward to patch 3.2. Like everyone not farming Ulduar-25, I'm hoping it'll deliver on its promise to make higher end content more accessible to players like me. That's a promise that Blizzard is bending over backwards to keep, and I honestly appreciate it.
Monday, June 22, 2009
First Weekend of Raids
We moved to Nagrand and changed our Guild name; we're no longer the Bank of NiHao (although that's still on Bloodhoof); we are now known as Rage On.
This was our first weekend of official raids on Nagrand. Here's what happened:
Saturday morning, 10 of us showed up and we stepped into Ulduar. We tried FL with 2 towers up, couldn't hack it, and took down one tower. Then we one-shot FL+1.
We killed Razorscale next and took a break from Ulduar to clear Vault of Archavon - our first time together as a Guild, and you can bet it's in our rotation now. I'd put up an Emalon kill screenshot as well but I forgot to take one.
Back to Ulduar, and we killed XT-002 and Kologarn in short order. Then we took a couple of tries at Auriaya, killing her on our third or fourth try. Hodir attempts next - 6 in total with not much to show for it. Then Ignis.
We attempted Ignis a total of 4 times (around the same number of times we wiped on his goddamn trash.) Then we called it a day.
Not enough people showed up Sunday morning, so we messed around and farmed instead. I left just before lunch as I had real life things to take care of. I went to my in-laws and spent a quiet afternoon in the company of family.
Driving back home, I got a text from Jizal (formerly Rizal) asking if I could log in. I was online within 15 minutes and got an invite into a Naxx run with a couple of PUGs from Happy Hour, a Guild we were looking at merging with when we were preparing to move to Nagrand. We cleared most of Naxxramas except for Kel'thuzad; unfortunately by that point in time 4 of us had to log off and we disbanded.
At 10:30 that evening I got another text from Jiz asking me to log in; there were 9 of us online and we would be clearing Naxxramas. I logged in and we proceeded to demolish the Eye of Eternity before heading to Naxx to kill Kel'thuzad. When he was dead, we moved back into Ulduar.
We killed Ignis on our fourth try. It took just over 6 minutes. It was 12:30 in the morning (2:30 am for poor Azmuth!) and we were all tired... but still high from a fresh boss kill.
We gave Iron Council a few tries before calling it a night.
Killing Ignis was the perfect way to cap our weekend of raiding. Most of us played too much WoW this past weekend - we'll get over it, I'm sure, but there's no way I want to make this level of time investment a regular thing. We raided for maybe 14 hours this past weekend. That's not healthy.
But it felt so good.
As Bladewisp (formerly Silverwisp) put it, "After the Ignis kill, I feel like a rock star."
We go after Hodir next weekend.
Friday, June 19, 2009
First PUG on Nagrand, My Healadin Spell Rotation
I ran my first PUG on Nagrand last night, an Obsidian Sanctum-25 run with a Guild named Viable. While it wasn't anything special - four wipes attempting Sarth+1, then a plain Sarth attempt - I was flabbergasted at my healing performance.
We had 5 healers for the run - a Resto Druid, Resto Shaman, and three Holy Paladins. The Druid topped the healing meters, as expected, followed closely by the Shammy (damn Chain Heal!). Then came the three Holy Pallies.
Of 5 healers, I came in fourth. And I had slightly better gear than the other two Paladins.
My ego bruised, I checked Recount to figure out exactly what had gone wrong. And there it was - the top Pally had been spamming Holy Light on the tank with no Beacon of Light. The bottom Pally had been spamming Flash of Light on the offtank.
And me? Holy Shock + Flash of Light on raid members, Beacon of Light on the main tank.
I had to stop and think about what led me to this style of healing and my healing spell rotation.
In a typical boss fight, I set up like this:
Tank throws up readycheck. I cast Beacon of Light. When readycheck is done, I throw a Sacred Shield on the tank. He charges in.
Once he takes a hit, I cast Holy Shock and follow it up with a Flash of Light (two if the first was an instant cast). At this point the tank should be getting heals from multiple sources, so I can take a break from healing and throw a Judgment on the boss (Wisdom if Jiz is in the raid, Light if not). I follow up with another Holy Shock and my first Holy Light of the raid.
It's a mana-efficient spell rotation that allows me to get important buffs (Judgements of the Pure and Light's Grace) while keeping the tank alive. Holy Light is a great spell, especially when glyphed, but it's a mana hog. I know we're in trouble if I'm doing nothing but spamming Holy Light.
After the PUG, in the comfort of a 5-man Bank of NiHao group, I opined that the reason I heal like this is that the folks I raid with seem to take less damage in the course of a fight. I mean, sure, they'll eat the occasional Flame Wall or run off Kologarn's ledge, but we're quite good at yelling at each other over Vent to get out of void zones.
I gave the lead Pally's style a try after I figured out what was going on. Instead of throwing out Holy Shocks and Flashes of Light, I just stood and chucked Holy Lights at the offtank. Sure enough, my healing performance on Recount started to improve. That growing pink bar lifted my spirits immensely. I was healing like a champion.
I ran out of mana two minutes into the fight.
We had 5 healers for the run - a Resto Druid, Resto Shaman, and three Holy Paladins. The Druid topped the healing meters, as expected, followed closely by the Shammy (damn Chain Heal!). Then came the three Holy Pallies.
Of 5 healers, I came in fourth. And I had slightly better gear than the other two Paladins.
My ego bruised, I checked Recount to figure out exactly what had gone wrong. And there it was - the top Pally had been spamming Holy Light on the tank with no Beacon of Light. The bottom Pally had been spamming Flash of Light on the offtank.
And me? Holy Shock + Flash of Light on raid members, Beacon of Light on the main tank.
I had to stop and think about what led me to this style of healing and my healing spell rotation.
In a typical boss fight, I set up like this:
Tank throws up readycheck. I cast Beacon of Light. When readycheck is done, I throw a Sacred Shield on the tank. He charges in.
Once he takes a hit, I cast Holy Shock and follow it up with a Flash of Light (two if the first was an instant cast). At this point the tank should be getting heals from multiple sources, so I can take a break from healing and throw a Judgment on the boss (Wisdom if Jiz is in the raid, Light if not). I follow up with another Holy Shock and my first Holy Light of the raid.
It's a mana-efficient spell rotation that allows me to get important buffs (Judgements of the Pure and Light's Grace) while keeping the tank alive. Holy Light is a great spell, especially when glyphed, but it's a mana hog. I know we're in trouble if I'm doing nothing but spamming Holy Light.
After the PUG, in the comfort of a 5-man Bank of NiHao group, I opined that the reason I heal like this is that the folks I raid with seem to take less damage in the course of a fight. I mean, sure, they'll eat the occasional Flame Wall or run off Kologarn's ledge, but we're quite good at yelling at each other over Vent to get out of void zones.
I gave the lead Pally's style a try after I figured out what was going on. Instead of throwing out Holy Shocks and Flashes of Light, I just stood and chucked Holy Lights at the offtank. Sure enough, my healing performance on Recount started to improve. That growing pink bar lifted my spirits immensely. I was healing like a champion.
I ran out of mana two minutes into the fight.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
A Sign of Things To Come
Well, I've made the move to Nagrand... actually four of us have. We're currently voting on the new Guild name via email. Bank of NiHao was fun, but we have an opportunity to improve on it along with a new lease on raiding.
Moving from a US server to an Oceanic server had one noticeable effect - it moved daily quest reset time from 3 pm local to God knows when. So I found myself with not a whole lot to do after 3 pm... and when I find myself with time to spare, I farm myself a Firefly.
It's a little known fact that I collect vanity pets. Avierra does, at least. Froufrou has exactly one pet Avi doesn't - the Phoenix Hatchling that drops from Heroic Magister's Terrace - but besides that, Avierra has 54. Yes, counting Stinker.
Yesterday made it 55.
10 hours of off and on farming. I'm still flying.
Moving from a US server to an Oceanic server had one noticeable effect - it moved daily quest reset time from 3 pm local to God knows when. So I found myself with not a whole lot to do after 3 pm... and when I find myself with time to spare, I farm myself a Firefly.
It's a little known fact that I collect vanity pets. Avierra does, at least. Froufrou has exactly one pet Avi doesn't - the Phoenix Hatchling that drops from Heroic Magister's Terrace - but besides that, Avierra has 54. Yes, counting Stinker.
Yesterday made it 55.
10 hours of off and on farming. I'm still flying.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
A Farewell to Bloodhoof
As I write this, the Bank of Nihao is packing everything up in preparation for a server move - off Bloodhoof and onto Nagrand, an Oceanic server. We've been discussing the move for more than a month now, and in light of our small raider base and our need to grow as we move deeper and deeper into Ulduar, it's a move that makes sense.
We're not leaving Bloodhoof without regrets. We're leaving behind friends we've known for a long time - friends with whom we've formed relationships with over vent and Guild/party/raid chat. We're leaving two of our raiders behind as well - which hurts our numbers even more than I care to think about, but that's the way it has to be, I guess.
Our last Bloodhoof raids this past weekend were glorious. We downed Flame Leviathan with one tower up, Razorscale, XT-002 Deconstructor, Kologarn, and Auriaya before clearing out Naxxramas and the Eye of Eternity. A few months ago, if you'd told me we would be at this level of progression, I would have laughed in your face. We've struggled so much with so many issues that it's a wonder we've achieved as much as we have.
We're moving off Bloodhoof because we're running out of raiders. In the past couple of weeks, we've lost a Retribution Paladin and a Balance Druid. For us to maintain our momentum, we need to recruit. Constantly borrowing raiders from GoV just isn't feasible any more. A server transfer to a GMT+8-friendly environment seemed the best option for us to continue raiding.
Nagrand is the unofficial GMT+8 server. When the first generation of ASTIG raiders moved on, a large group moved to Nagrand. (The current ASTIG raids on Thaurissan.) By my count, there are four large Asian-time Guilds making their way through Ulduar on Nagrand. That means that we won't have to wake up early on weekends to PUG Naxx-25; we'll have the opportunity to PUG on weeknights instead. It also means that recruitment will be easier for us, or at least we hope it will be easier.
Oh, but I will miss Bloodhoof.
Bloodhoof is where I moved after ASTIG went stale... after ASTIG gave up on endgame raiding. It's where I first stepped into SSC and TK and Hyjal. (I haven't tried raiding Black Temple or Sunwell yet, although I still hope to someday.) It's where Froufrou learned to raid.
Bloodhoof is where our little band of brothers first put together the thought of raiding together. When we first started playing together, we were officemates first and Guildies second. Now, we're Guildies first and (ex-)officemates second, bound by beer, Ventrilo and shiny purple pixels.
And now we're leaving Bloodhoof.
I am sorely tempted to close this blog now. I've lost a lot of the angst that drove me to start blogging in the first place, and when I need a quick fix I can just hop on Twitter and let the world know I'm annoyed at something.
If anything, though, this blog is about remembering things as they were when they were fresh. Reading old posts brings me back, sort of like reading an old diary. (My God, was I ever that naive?)
So here's what I can promise: I'll think about keeping this blog up. I really will. I don't want to commit and not follow through, but I also don't want to lose this blog entirely.
So farewell, Bloodhoof, and hello Nagrand: I'm looking forward to meeting you.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Healer QQ
Does everything in Ulduar have to hit like Godzilla on steroids? I think I've killed Malago thrice while Holy Light was casting.
/readycheck done
Malago runs in.
He takes 30% damage - Holy Shock! brings him up to 90% health.
He takes 35% damage - Insta-Flash of Light! brings him back up to 70% health.
Start casting Holy Light... he takes two hits and dies.
Me (on vent): Wipe it, guys.
This is, of course, assuming Mal doesn't run into Kologarn's pants like he did last weekend.
/readycheck done
Malago runs in.
He takes 30% damage - Holy Shock! brings him up to 90% health.
He takes 35% damage - Insta-Flash of Light! brings him back up to 70% health.
Start casting Holy Light... he takes two hits and dies.
Me (on vent): Wipe it, guys.
This is, of course, assuming Mal doesn't run into Kologarn's pants like he did last weekend.
Ferarro
Okay, it's time for me to put my 2 coppers in regarding the whole Ferarro mess.
I don't play a Retribution Paladin. I love my main character - who is, in fact, a Paladin - but Retribution is not my playstyle.
That doesn't mean I don't appreciate good Ret Pallies. I recognize that other people make fantastic Ret Pallies. I play with a Ret Pally named Rizal who blows me away with his mad DPS skillz. I think Ret Pallies are a very welcome addition to the family of viable raid specs.
I learned a lot of things about Retribution Paladins from Ferarro's blog. I came there to be educated and entertained. For that I will always be grateful to whoever was behind the blog.
Regardless of what Jong says, the content was solid, and it remains a great resource for Paladins of all stripes.
But.
The Lost snippets, the photos, the non-WoW blog posts, they were what made me connect to the author of the blog. Did it help that she was an attractive blonde? Hell yes. But give me some credit; I don't follow bloggers at random based on their looks.
To find out that the photos were stolen from another blogger was a slap in the face.
To find out that other content was taken and repurposed was a stab in the heart.
These are things you do not do.
Like the rest of the community who visited Ferarro's blog, I was deeply disappointed in how the whole mess was handled by the nameless person at the keyboard. There were so many ways that it could have been handled better. Ways that did not involve the ongoing theft of another blogger's content to maintain a five-year-old deception.
I wonder how much the image of the WoW blogger has been tainted by this whole scandal. Speaking as a very insignificant member of this slice of the blogosphere, I can say that it just became a bit harder to hold my head up high.
So here's what I propose: let's call it even.
Nameless blogger, if you want to go out and set up your own Ret-Pally blog, that's fine. My best wishes to you. I may even drop by for a visit. If there's something there I connect with, I may even leave a comment.
In exchange, shut down Ferarro's blog. Right now. The guides can be hosted on Retpaladin.com if there's a clamor for them to stay up. But get rid of that blog; it's tainted.
And for Christ's sake, please leave Sarah Townsend alone.
I don't play a Retribution Paladin. I love my main character - who is, in fact, a Paladin - but Retribution is not my playstyle.
That doesn't mean I don't appreciate good Ret Pallies. I recognize that other people make fantastic Ret Pallies. I play with a Ret Pally named Rizal who blows me away with his mad DPS skillz. I think Ret Pallies are a very welcome addition to the family of viable raid specs.
I learned a lot of things about Retribution Paladins from Ferarro's blog. I came there to be educated and entertained. For that I will always be grateful to whoever was behind the blog.
Regardless of what Jong says, the content was solid, and it remains a great resource for Paladins of all stripes.
But.
The Lost snippets, the photos, the non-WoW blog posts, they were what made me connect to the author of the blog. Did it help that she was an attractive blonde? Hell yes. But give me some credit; I don't follow bloggers at random based on their looks.
To find out that the photos were stolen from another blogger was a slap in the face.
To find out that other content was taken and repurposed was a stab in the heart.
These are things you do not do.
Like the rest of the community who visited Ferarro's blog, I was deeply disappointed in how the whole mess was handled by the nameless person at the keyboard. There were so many ways that it could have been handled better. Ways that did not involve the ongoing theft of another blogger's content to maintain a five-year-old deception.
I wonder how much the image of the WoW blogger has been tainted by this whole scandal. Speaking as a very insignificant member of this slice of the blogosphere, I can say that it just became a bit harder to hold my head up high.
So here's what I propose: let's call it even.
Nameless blogger, if you want to go out and set up your own Ret-Pally blog, that's fine. My best wishes to you. I may even drop by for a visit. If there's something there I connect with, I may even leave a comment.
In exchange, shut down Ferarro's blog. Right now. The guides can be hosted on Retpaladin.com if there's a clamor for them to stay up. But get rid of that blog; it's tainted.
And for Christ's sake, please leave Sarah Townsend alone.
Monday, June 1, 2009
I'm Still Alive
So there's a pally on my server named Healismyjob. I see him all the time on LFG: "Prot/ret pally LFG".
Seriously.
It's been a month since I last posted; stuff's happened, and I'll be back soon once I sort things out.
Megan and Ferraro broke my heart, you see. You don't get up and walk away from that kind of pain.
Seriously.
It's been a month since I last posted; stuff's happened, and I'll be back soon once I sort things out.
Megan and Ferraro broke my heart, you see. You don't get up and walk away from that kind of pain.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Divine Anguish
Right now, we're caught in what Seth Godin calls The Dip - that space right after the initial rush when you've first started something and you're still enthusiastic about it... when suddenly things are difficult and bleak and it's easy to slack off.
I can't say I saw it coming.
Last Saturday was one of our best raiding days ever. We downed Malygos in 5 attempts (down from 9) despite 2 weeks of not raiding. Then we marched into Naxxramas and one-shot all the bosses, getting Make Quick Werk of Him, The Hundred Club and Arachnophobia along the way. Then we gave Ulduar a try - and downed Flame Leviathan on the second attempt.
So far, so good.
We wiped around 6 or 7 times on XT-002 Deconstructor after that, but that was ok. We logged out on Saturday night with high hopes for the next day.
On Sunday we wiped to the trash leading up to Ignis no less than ten times. Then we wiped to Ignis another fifteen.
When the trash respawned, we made our way to XT-002 again and proceeded to wipe another thirty or so times.
At the end of the day, we logged out extremely dissatisfied. We'd learned a lot, but the cost was high - I spent nearly 600 gold on repairs, and that doesn't count consumables. I think we'll have to resort to raid stacking to kill XT-002, at least until we increase everyone's DPS significantly. I can't say I'm too happy about that.
I've been angry and irritable a lot lately (lots of things on my mind, including a pending issue at work). This doesn't really help.
The damn Dip hit at the worst possible time.
I can't say I saw it coming.
Last Saturday was one of our best raiding days ever. We downed Malygos in 5 attempts (down from 9) despite 2 weeks of not raiding. Then we marched into Naxxramas and one-shot all the bosses, getting Make Quick Werk of Him, The Hundred Club and Arachnophobia along the way. Then we gave Ulduar a try - and downed Flame Leviathan on the second attempt.
So far, so good.
We wiped around 6 or 7 times on XT-002 Deconstructor after that, but that was ok. We logged out on Saturday night with high hopes for the next day.
On Sunday we wiped to the trash leading up to Ignis no less than ten times. Then we wiped to Ignis another fifteen.
When the trash respawned, we made our way to XT-002 again and proceeded to wipe another thirty or so times.
At the end of the day, we logged out extremely dissatisfied. We'd learned a lot, but the cost was high - I spent nearly 600 gold on repairs, and that doesn't count consumables. I think we'll have to resort to raid stacking to kill XT-002, at least until we increase everyone's DPS significantly. I can't say I'm too happy about that.
I've been angry and irritable a lot lately (lots of things on my mind, including a pending issue at work). This doesn't really help.
The damn Dip hit at the worst possible time.
Healing QQ
I asked three of my raiders to brush up on their healing (they're currently DPS) over the past weekend, as the state of our healers is dismal: we're reduced to 2-healing instances since our second Resto Shammy is on burnout break and our Resto Druid has gone MIA.
To my face they said that they would gladly learn to heal. Then I find out later that there was much QQing going on about that.
It's not like I friggin' asked them to take over main healing Ulduar, either. With Naxx on farm, we're clearing bosses so easily that gearing up and training a fresh healer is easy; our main specs mostly need gear from Sapphiron and Kel'Thuzad.
My primary spec is Protection. It's to allow more people to raid that I throw Holy Lights around. Maybe I need to remind people of that.
Maybe it's time to go on strike.
edit: Or a break. I'm burned out-ish. Or headed that way.
To my face they said that they would gladly learn to heal. Then I find out later that there was much QQing going on about that.
It's not like I friggin' asked them to take over main healing Ulduar, either. With Naxx on farm, we're clearing bosses so easily that gearing up and training a fresh healer is easy; our main specs mostly need gear from Sapphiron and Kel'Thuzad.
My primary spec is Protection. It's to allow more people to raid that I throw Holy Lights around. Maybe I need to remind people of that.
Maybe it's time to go on strike.
edit: Or a break. I'm burned out-ish. Or headed that way.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Raidleading 101: Raid Composition
So you and nine of your buddies have formed a Guild. You're level 80, in blue gear and ready to step into Obsidian Sanctum/Naxxramas/Vault of Archavon in the hopes of some nice purple loot. You're about to lead your first raid.
This and the subsequent Raidleading 101 posts are for you. I'm going to assume that while you've had some group experience, you're not an expert on the different classes and what makes them tick. I hope that you've raided before, either as part of a larger Guild or in a PUG.
If you haven't raided before, I strongly advise you to do so before becoming a raid leader. If you really have no choice - no one else will take the role - then by all means read on.
No job, not even that of the main tank, is as stressful as that of the raid leader's. While you're leading a raid, you're not one of the guys - you stand above them, deciding right and wrong. When you're not raiding you will be watching videos, reading strategy guides, and encouraging people to be ready and available for the next scheduled run. Whether or not your Guild is hardcore, your time as a casual player has come to an end.
There are three things you'll need to address as a raid leader: (1) raid composition, (2) raid conduct (including boss fight strategies), and (3) loot distribution. Today I'll discuss the first of these three.
(In NiHao we've split up these roles: I set up the raid, Azmuth runs it, and Malago distributes loot. It's a system that's served us well so far.)
Raid composition, in theory, is simple - you fill up the raid with the appropriate mix of raiders. For 10-man raids, the configuration we work with for progression raids is 2T-3H-3/2D: 2 tanks, 3 healers, and 5 DPS (3 melee/2 ranged or vice versa). For farm raids we drop one healer and put in one more DPS, making it 2T-2H-3/3D. But 2-3-3/2 will get you through most fights.
(For 25-mans, which we don't run, I believe the composition is 4-7-14 for progression and 4-6-15 for farm raids. The fights are a little more forgiving, so you don't have to be so strict regarding melee vs. ranged DPS.)
You will need two tanks - one to be the "main tank" and one to be the "off tank". The main tank's job is to tank bosses during boss fights; the off tank's job is (usually) to pick up adds. Even in 25-man runs you will have just one main tank; every tank who isn't the main tank is an off tank.
Fill up your tank slots first. A good tank makes or breaks a raid - you can survive with noob healers but not a noob tank. Our policy is to run with at least one of our "official" tanks - Azmuth (DK), Calimdan (Druid), Malago (Warrior) or Avierra (Paladin). When we run with a tank who isn't one of these four, they are always the off tank. I wouldn't dream of setting up a raid without one of these four tanking.
Because tanking is such a high profile role, plenty of egotists try to become tanks. Avoid these people like the plague; the last thing you need is a prima donna in this highly sensitive role. In the best Guilds, tanking is a shared responsibility shouldered by a team.
Sometimes your off-tank is better for a fight by virtue of his class - for example, some fights need AoE tanking, so your Paladin offtank will be better suited than your Druid main tank. Don't hesitate to put your offtank on it, and be sure to head off any drama your Druid tank is tempted to cause.
In general, I don't like to run with two tanks of the same class. Different tanks have different strengths; having my tanks be different classes gives me more flexibility in conducting the run.
When you've filled up your tank slots, get to work on your healers.
In general you're looking at your healers to fulfill two functions: tank healing and raid healing. Tank healers focus on one target and heal him almost exclusively - if anyone else dies, that's not their problem. Raid healers take care of the rest of the raid. If the tank starts losing health faster than the tank healers can cope, however, they're expected to pitch in.
Got a priest? Good. Make sure he's specced Holy or Discipline, though. Priests are the best all-around healers, hands down - a great Priest can solo heal a raid, but of course you wouldn't subject your Priest to that kind of stress. Get all the Priests you can; don't be shy about filling both (or all three) healer slots with Priests.
As an aside, I consider Priests to be the best health managers. They have the most tools to address health - Fortitude to boost hit points, direct heals and heal over time spells, and a shield to absorb damage. They give up a lot to be the best at this role, however.
What about other classes? I find Resto Druids to be just as effective as Priests, although that may be because I play with a very skilled Resto Druid. Holy Paladins and Restoration Shamans are somewhat more problematic for me (and I play a Holy Pally!). In general, Holy Pallies are fantastic tank healers and poor raid healers, while Resto Shammies are the reverse. But player skill can often make up for class deficiencies - I've run Naxxramas with 2 Resto Shammies, no problem. I'd still balk at running with 2 Holy Pallies, though.
Now take a look at your available DPS.
Melee DPS take the fight to the boss - preferably from safely behind him to maximize damage and so the tank doesn't get parry gibbed. In most cases, melee DPS provide a stream of consistent damage that you can count on provided they can spend enough time on target. There are exceptions to this rule - Retribution Paladins, Enhancement Shamans and some Rogue specs do bursty damage.
The downside of melee DPS is that they are, in many ways, marked for death. Their aggro pull threshold is lower and there are more boss effects in the game that can kill them compared to ranged DPS. Melee DPS are also very sensitive to location and position - in fights like Kel'Thuzad and Thaddius, bad DPS positioning can kill the tank quickly. Melee DPS also have the most difficulty spending time on one target, especially on moving fights. Expect their DPS to be lower than usual on fights that require kiting or target switching.
Ranged DPS, on the other hand, attack a boss from a distance. Hunters, Mages and Warlocks are the most common ranged DPS around, but you may find yourself running with Shadow Priests, Elemental Shamans or Balance Druids as well. Ranged DPS in general do bursty damage, although Hunters tend to have more consistent damage outputs, and Warlock DOTs (remember those?) help smoothen out their DPS curve.
Why take melee DPS when ranged DPS doesn't have as many drawbacks? The answer is mana. Every ranged DPS class is dependent on mana. While mana isn't really a problem for short fights, longer fights can take their toll on a caster's (yes, Hunters are also casters) mana pool. Warriors, Rogues and Death Knights - all melee DPS classes - can carry on the fight long after the casters have run out of mana.
There are two more functions your DPS have to fulfill - crowd control, or CC, and area of effect damage, also known as AE, AOE, or AoE.
Crowd control is simple: when you encounter more mobs than you have tanks, and you don't want your tanks to pick up more than one mob each, you will want to CC something. What makes crowd control tricky is that there are restrictions to every type of CC. For example, Rogue CC ("Sap") only works on humanoids and can't be applied in combat. Mage CC ("Polymorph" or "Sheep") can affect humanoids and beasts in or out of combat. Hunter CC ("Freezing Trap") affects practically anything, but it's dependent on position.
Knowing what classes can CC and what classes can't, and the restrictions behind each type of CC, is essential to your career as a raid leader. If you don't know, ask - you're not expected to know the intricacies of each class (although that can be helpful).
The other thing you'll want to keep in mind is Area of Effect damage. This is much simpler - the best AoE'ers are Mages and Warlocks. Other classes have some AoE - Paladins have Consecration, Rogues Fan of Knives, and Hunters Volley, for example - but Mage and Warlock AoE work best. Fights with a lot of small non-elite adds usually call for a lot of AoE.
As with crowd control, learning which classes can AoE and the limitations of their AoE is essential in your career as a raid leader. Not having good AoE won't keep your raid from downing bosses, but having it for some fights will make your raid run more smoothly.
So now that you've got your raid together, it's time to march into the instance and take on some bosses. In the next installment I'll cover raid conduct - how to prepare for your raids and more importantly, how to deal with your raid as it's going on. Till then, may your fights be easy and your raids drama-free.
This and the subsequent Raidleading 101 posts are for you. I'm going to assume that while you've had some group experience, you're not an expert on the different classes and what makes them tick. I hope that you've raided before, either as part of a larger Guild or in a PUG.
If you haven't raided before, I strongly advise you to do so before becoming a raid leader. If you really have no choice - no one else will take the role - then by all means read on.
No job, not even that of the main tank, is as stressful as that of the raid leader's. While you're leading a raid, you're not one of the guys - you stand above them, deciding right and wrong. When you're not raiding you will be watching videos, reading strategy guides, and encouraging people to be ready and available for the next scheduled run. Whether or not your Guild is hardcore, your time as a casual player has come to an end.
There are three things you'll need to address as a raid leader: (1) raid composition, (2) raid conduct (including boss fight strategies), and (3) loot distribution. Today I'll discuss the first of these three.
(In NiHao we've split up these roles: I set up the raid, Azmuth runs it, and Malago distributes loot. It's a system that's served us well so far.)
Raid composition, in theory, is simple - you fill up the raid with the appropriate mix of raiders. For 10-man raids, the configuration we work with for progression raids is 2T-3H-3/2D: 2 tanks, 3 healers, and 5 DPS (3 melee/2 ranged or vice versa). For farm raids we drop one healer and put in one more DPS, making it 2T-2H-3/3D. But 2-3-3/2 will get you through most fights.
(For 25-mans, which we don't run, I believe the composition is 4-7-14 for progression and 4-6-15 for farm raids. The fights are a little more forgiving, so you don't have to be so strict regarding melee vs. ranged DPS.)
You will need two tanks - one to be the "main tank" and one to be the "off tank". The main tank's job is to tank bosses during boss fights; the off tank's job is (usually) to pick up adds. Even in 25-man runs you will have just one main tank; every tank who isn't the main tank is an off tank.
Fill up your tank slots first. A good tank makes or breaks a raid - you can survive with noob healers but not a noob tank. Our policy is to run with at least one of our "official" tanks - Azmuth (DK), Calimdan (Druid), Malago (Warrior) or Avierra (Paladin). When we run with a tank who isn't one of these four, they are always the off tank. I wouldn't dream of setting up a raid without one of these four tanking.
Because tanking is such a high profile role, plenty of egotists try to become tanks. Avoid these people like the plague; the last thing you need is a prima donna in this highly sensitive role. In the best Guilds, tanking is a shared responsibility shouldered by a team.
Sometimes your off-tank is better for a fight by virtue of his class - for example, some fights need AoE tanking, so your Paladin offtank will be better suited than your Druid main tank. Don't hesitate to put your offtank on it, and be sure to head off any drama your Druid tank is tempted to cause.
In general, I don't like to run with two tanks of the same class. Different tanks have different strengths; having my tanks be different classes gives me more flexibility in conducting the run.
When you've filled up your tank slots, get to work on your healers.
In general you're looking at your healers to fulfill two functions: tank healing and raid healing. Tank healers focus on one target and heal him almost exclusively - if anyone else dies, that's not their problem. Raid healers take care of the rest of the raid. If the tank starts losing health faster than the tank healers can cope, however, they're expected to pitch in.
Got a priest? Good. Make sure he's specced Holy or Discipline, though. Priests are the best all-around healers, hands down - a great Priest can solo heal a raid, but of course you wouldn't subject your Priest to that kind of stress. Get all the Priests you can; don't be shy about filling both (or all three) healer slots with Priests.
As an aside, I consider Priests to be the best health managers. They have the most tools to address health - Fortitude to boost hit points, direct heals and heal over time spells, and a shield to absorb damage. They give up a lot to be the best at this role, however.
What about other classes? I find Resto Druids to be just as effective as Priests, although that may be because I play with a very skilled Resto Druid. Holy Paladins and Restoration Shamans are somewhat more problematic for me (and I play a Holy Pally!). In general, Holy Pallies are fantastic tank healers and poor raid healers, while Resto Shammies are the reverse. But player skill can often make up for class deficiencies - I've run Naxxramas with 2 Resto Shammies, no problem. I'd still balk at running with 2 Holy Pallies, though.
Now take a look at your available DPS.
Melee DPS take the fight to the boss - preferably from safely behind him to maximize damage and so the tank doesn't get parry gibbed. In most cases, melee DPS provide a stream of consistent damage that you can count on provided they can spend enough time on target. There are exceptions to this rule - Retribution Paladins, Enhancement Shamans and some Rogue specs do bursty damage.
The downside of melee DPS is that they are, in many ways, marked for death. Their aggro pull threshold is lower and there are more boss effects in the game that can kill them compared to ranged DPS. Melee DPS are also very sensitive to location and position - in fights like Kel'Thuzad and Thaddius, bad DPS positioning can kill the tank quickly. Melee DPS also have the most difficulty spending time on one target, especially on moving fights. Expect their DPS to be lower than usual on fights that require kiting or target switching.
Ranged DPS, on the other hand, attack a boss from a distance. Hunters, Mages and Warlocks are the most common ranged DPS around, but you may find yourself running with Shadow Priests, Elemental Shamans or Balance Druids as well. Ranged DPS in general do bursty damage, although Hunters tend to have more consistent damage outputs, and Warlock DOTs (remember those?) help smoothen out their DPS curve.
Why take melee DPS when ranged DPS doesn't have as many drawbacks? The answer is mana. Every ranged DPS class is dependent on mana. While mana isn't really a problem for short fights, longer fights can take their toll on a caster's (yes, Hunters are also casters) mana pool. Warriors, Rogues and Death Knights - all melee DPS classes - can carry on the fight long after the casters have run out of mana.
There are two more functions your DPS have to fulfill - crowd control, or CC, and area of effect damage, also known as AE, AOE, or AoE.
Crowd control is simple: when you encounter more mobs than you have tanks, and you don't want your tanks to pick up more than one mob each, you will want to CC something. What makes crowd control tricky is that there are restrictions to every type of CC. For example, Rogue CC ("Sap") only works on humanoids and can't be applied in combat. Mage CC ("Polymorph" or "Sheep") can affect humanoids and beasts in or out of combat. Hunter CC ("Freezing Trap") affects practically anything, but it's dependent on position.
Knowing what classes can CC and what classes can't, and the restrictions behind each type of CC, is essential to your career as a raid leader. If you don't know, ask - you're not expected to know the intricacies of each class (although that can be helpful).
The other thing you'll want to keep in mind is Area of Effect damage. This is much simpler - the best AoE'ers are Mages and Warlocks. Other classes have some AoE - Paladins have Consecration, Rogues Fan of Knives, and Hunters Volley, for example - but Mage and Warlock AoE work best. Fights with a lot of small non-elite adds usually call for a lot of AoE.
As with crowd control, learning which classes can AoE and the limitations of their AoE is essential in your career as a raid leader. Not having good AoE won't keep your raid from downing bosses, but having it for some fights will make your raid run more smoothly.
So now that you've got your raid together, it's time to march into the instance and take on some bosses. In the next installment I'll cover raid conduct - how to prepare for your raids and more importantly, how to deal with your raid as it's going on. Till then, may your fights be easy and your raids drama-free.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Noob Spec
So I'm specced Retribution.
This might not be an issue for other Paladins, but it certainly is an issue for me. Ret for me is noob spec - not that noobs play Retribution Paladins (although there are a lot who do) but that I'm a noob when it comes to playing Ret.
I've been specced Retribution for the past two weeks - during raid break, when it'll affect our runs the least. I'm getting a free respec anyway, and I had all this offspec gear stowed away in the bank.
So I specced Ret.
Here's the secret: I like it.
I don't like it enough to raid with it; we already run with two talented ret Paladins. But I like it enough that I've run dailies with it.
Thanks to Malago, last night I ran two Heroics in it as well. I didn't do too badly - 1,800 DPS at my lowest point.
The thing I dislike the most about Ret is how fragile I am. I don't die soloing mobs in Holy spec. I don't die in Prot spec. But I take dirt naps all the time in Ret spec.
But let me also say that I've never killed things as fast. One spell cycle is usually enough to down a mob. In Prot or Holy spec, I usually take two cycles.
Ret is awesome but it's not my spec. My hat's off to Ferraro, Megan and the many brilliant Ret paladin players out there.
Maybe someday I'll learn to do better than faceroll.
This might not be an issue for other Paladins, but it certainly is an issue for me. Ret for me is noob spec - not that noobs play Retribution Paladins (although there are a lot who do) but that I'm a noob when it comes to playing Ret.
I've been specced Retribution for the past two weeks - during raid break, when it'll affect our runs the least. I'm getting a free respec anyway, and I had all this offspec gear stowed away in the bank.
So I specced Ret.
Here's the secret: I like it.
I don't like it enough to raid with it; we already run with two talented ret Paladins. But I like it enough that I've run dailies with it.
Thanks to Malago, last night I ran two Heroics in it as well. I didn't do too badly - 1,800 DPS at my lowest point.
The thing I dislike the most about Ret is how fragile I am. I don't die soloing mobs in Holy spec. I don't die in Prot spec. But I take dirt naps all the time in Ret spec.
But let me also say that I've never killed things as fast. One spell cycle is usually enough to down a mob. In Prot or Holy spec, I usually take two cycles.
Ret is awesome but it's not my spec. My hat's off to Ferraro, Megan and the many brilliant Ret paladin players out there.
Maybe someday I'll learn to do better than faceroll.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Guess What We Did Last Weekend
22 February 2009: Naxxramas is repossessed after Kel'Thuzad defaults on his mortgage.
22 March 2009: The Bank of NiHao help Alexstraza collect from her deadbeat brother Malygos.
29 March 2009: The Bank of NiHao Foreclosure Team shows up at the Obsidian Sanctum. Sartharion and Tenebron snicker at the "flammable little insects."
29 March 2009: Sartharion and Tenebron learn to say I'm sorry.
Congrats to the Bank of NiHao for finally getting Sarth+1D down. To quote Malago, "You guys make me hard."
22 March 2009: The Bank of NiHao help Alexstraza collect from her deadbeat brother Malygos.
29 March 2009: The Bank of NiHao Foreclosure Team shows up at the Obsidian Sanctum. Sartharion and Tenebron snicker at the "flammable little insects."
29 March 2009: Sartharion and Tenebron learn to say I'm sorry.
Congrats to the Bank of NiHao for finally getting Sarth+1D down. To quote Malago, "You guys make me hard."
Big Red Kitty closes up shop
I occasionally wonder how I'll end this blog - whether or not walk away from both game and blog in one tempestuous, emotionally-charged post, or quietly let the blog die, leaving its six or seven readers* bewildered as to the lack of updates.
Big Red Kitty shuttered its doors today for reasons I can relate to. Although it was primarily a hunter blog, I always enjoyed BRK's posts. BRK made it clear that there was a critical difference between hunters and huntards. His sheer love of the game and the great enthusiasm he brought to his craft made me appreciate my time in Azeroth more.
My hat's off to you, BRK. Thanks for everything.
* I should be so lucky.
Big Red Kitty shuttered its doors today for reasons I can relate to. Although it was primarily a hunter blog, I always enjoyed BRK's posts. BRK made it clear that there was a critical difference between hunters and huntards. His sheer love of the game and the great enthusiasm he brought to his craft made me appreciate my time in Azeroth more.
My hat's off to you, BRK. Thanks for everything.
* I should be so lucky.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Malygos DOWN!
This should be a rather emo blog entry whining about how folks aren't punctual or don't update me on what their availabilities are; really, that's how this post played out in my head. But the truth is that we had a brilliant weekend raiding and while we definitely need to address concerns regarding punctuality and maybe even commitment, I need to talk about the great things that happened so I don't forget it months down the road when these achievements will have been eclipsed by newer ones.
On Saturday afternoon we began our Naxxramas run at 12:30 and proceeded to demolish every wing in the raid. We cleared the entire instance in 5 hours - still long compared to more hardcore raiders, but a vast improvement over our usual 9 to 11 hour raid time. We one-shotted every boss but Grobbulus and Kel'Thuzad. Grobb, a technically difficult fight, really caused us a lot of headaches. We were quite unlucky with our DPS positioning in some cases, which led to too many slimes spawned. Kel'Thuzad, on the other hand, was harder for us due to void zones spawning under the adds, where the tanks couldn't see them.
Azmuth paid for a new Ventrilo server for us, which we'll be trying out over the next few months. For the first time I really feel pressured to talk over Vent - it's different now that we don't have that many players around. I'd really like to maximize the use of the Vent server while we have it. The Vent server was quite useful for some of the harder fights, but as usual, we avoided using it.
We also tried out a new strategy for the 4 Horsemen, which led to a one-shot instead of our usual 5-6 attempts. The DPS start the fight right behind Lady Blameaux's position, while the tanks wait near the front of the room where Baron Rivendare and Thane Kor'thazz will start the fight. Once the fight starts, they then pick up the melee horsemen and kite them back to the ranged horsemen. On three marks, everyone swaps sides, and the tanks need to taunt off each other to ensure that the melee horsemen stick to their sides. While we had a few deaths, this strategy really worked for us, and we'll be using this in the future.
Sunday was a rough raiding day for us; even though we had a posted raid time of 12:30, we started at 2 pm due to lack of raiders. We finally downed Malygos after 21 attempts - 21! While hardly a flawless victory, it was a victory nonetheless, and we'll be coming back next week with high expectations for ourselves.
Killing Malygos unlocked an Achievement, of course, and I'm proud to note that Avierra is now a Champion of the Frozen Wastes, along with Azmuth, Silverwisp, Elauris, Damo, Brutusk and Calimdan.
Well done, everyone. Well done.
On Saturday afternoon we began our Naxxramas run at 12:30 and proceeded to demolish every wing in the raid. We cleared the entire instance in 5 hours - still long compared to more hardcore raiders, but a vast improvement over our usual 9 to 11 hour raid time. We one-shotted every boss but Grobbulus and Kel'Thuzad. Grobb, a technically difficult fight, really caused us a lot of headaches. We were quite unlucky with our DPS positioning in some cases, which led to too many slimes spawned. Kel'Thuzad, on the other hand, was harder for us due to void zones spawning under the adds, where the tanks couldn't see them.
Azmuth paid for a new Ventrilo server for us, which we'll be trying out over the next few months. For the first time I really feel pressured to talk over Vent - it's different now that we don't have that many players around. I'd really like to maximize the use of the Vent server while we have it. The Vent server was quite useful for some of the harder fights, but as usual, we avoided using it.
We also tried out a new strategy for the 4 Horsemen, which led to a one-shot instead of our usual 5-6 attempts. The DPS start the fight right behind Lady Blameaux's position, while the tanks wait near the front of the room where Baron Rivendare and Thane Kor'thazz will start the fight. Once the fight starts, they then pick up the melee horsemen and kite them back to the ranged horsemen. On three marks, everyone swaps sides, and the tanks need to taunt off each other to ensure that the melee horsemen stick to their sides. While we had a few deaths, this strategy really worked for us, and we'll be using this in the future.
Sunday was a rough raiding day for us; even though we had a posted raid time of 12:30, we started at 2 pm due to lack of raiders. We finally downed Malygos after 21 attempts - 21! While hardly a flawless victory, it was a victory nonetheless, and we'll be coming back next week with high expectations for ourselves.
Killing Malygos unlocked an Achievement, of course, and I'm proud to note that Avierra is now a Champion of the Frozen Wastes, along with Azmuth, Silverwisp, Elauris, Damo, Brutusk and Calimdan.
Well done, everyone. Well done.
Friday, March 13, 2009
A Quick Post Before The Weekend
One day more till Malygos.
Over the past week, we've seen fewer and fewer log-ins: for most of us, work is starting to pick up. Rizal's been sidelined thanks to major deadlines for one of his accounts, and I know that Calimdan's been dealing with midterms. I'm happy to see that some of us are still running heroics during the week, though.
This weekend we'll be taking on Malygos, in an effort to down him before the Ulduar patch arrives. We've all spent a considerable amount of time and effort preparing for this fight; let's hope it pays off.
Over the past week, we've seen fewer and fewer log-ins: for most of us, work is starting to pick up. Rizal's been sidelined thanks to major deadlines for one of his accounts, and I know that Calimdan's been dealing with midterms. I'm happy to see that some of us are still running heroics during the week, though.
This weekend we'll be taking on Malygos, in an effort to down him before the Ulduar patch arrives. We've all spent a considerable amount of time and effort preparing for this fight; let's hope it pays off.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
So GoV...
I've been tempted to post something in response to Cath's post on the forums.
But I'm quite good at resisting temptation, so all I have to say is, the best of luck to GoV, and thanks very much for everything.
But I'm quite good at resisting temptation, so all I have to say is, the best of luck to GoV, and thanks very much for everything.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
New Paladin Tools in WOTLK
There are two new tricks Paladins have in Wrath of the Lich King I'm relying on more and more.
Hand of Reckoning
I have only rarely needed to use the badly-named Hand of Reckoning a few times in protection spec, preferring instead to stick to my tried-and-true Righteous Defense. I don't use it to initiate combat - once the taunt buff wears off, the mob usually heads straight for any healer within range, forcing me to burn Righteous Defense anyway. That said, I've learned to appreciate it while farming solo, especially when I'm competing with others for mobs.
I use it extensively on Gluth. We don't rely on hunters to kite zombie chow, as our huntards are terribad at kiting. Instead I slap on my tanking gear for extra dodge and run around, picking up spawning zombies with HoR and cementing my hold on them through the occasional Consecration. I also use it on 4 Horsemen to ensure that the Horseman I'm tanking doesn't ignore me completely.
I understand that it's brilliant in PVP - a taunt that actually does damage, preventing rogues from stealthing - and I'm keen to test the report that it breaks through Divine Shield, preventing bubble hearths. Now if only it interrupted casting...
Beacon of Light
Four major changes to paladin healing have challenged me this expansion:
1) The need to judge,
2) The newfound viability of Holy Shock as a healing spell,
3) Sacred Shield, and
4) Beacon of Light.
Of these changes, Beacon of Light has forced me to rethink how I heal the most. Beacon of Light effectively forks your heal onto a second target, healing it for up to however much your first heal landed for. So if you had your Beacon of Light on Target B while you healed Target A, Target B would receive heals up to however much Target A was healed for.
Say, for example, that my main tank, Azmuth, was standing in front of a boss mob. Az has 29,000 hit points and the boss hits for around 6,000 on plate. Behind the boss is one of my melee DPS, Malago, who has 18,000 hit points. Unfortunately, this boss casts a spell which does 10,000 damage to a melee player in range. So Az gets hit for 6,000, bringing him down to 23,000, while Mal gets hit for 10,000, bringing him down to 8,000 hit points.
Let's say I had my Beacon of Light on Malago. If I threw a heal on Azmuth for 10,000, that would heal him back to full - wasting 4,000 hit points (overheal). Malago would not be healed to full, as he only receives 6,000 hit points back. So now I have a healing deficit; I need to throw another heal on Malago to make up the gap. This would be remedied by putting Beacon of Light on Az and healing Malago instead.
This is why Beacon of Light messes me up so badly. In order to know how to maximize my healing output, I need to be deeply aware of the fight mechanics. I need to know who will be taking damage - and how much - so I don't waste my Beacon on someone who won't be getting hurt anyway. If I shift my healing target, I waste one GCD on transferring the Beacon to someone else. More often than not I find myself forgetting to refresh Beacon.
That said, Beacon is insanely powerful, although I often wish they'd made it a 2 or 3 minute buff instead (it's currently a 1 minute buff). I like having it in my arsenal. Maybe I just need to learn to use it better.
Hand of Reckoning
I have only rarely needed to use the badly-named Hand of Reckoning a few times in protection spec, preferring instead to stick to my tried-and-true Righteous Defense. I don't use it to initiate combat - once the taunt buff wears off, the mob usually heads straight for any healer within range, forcing me to burn Righteous Defense anyway. That said, I've learned to appreciate it while farming solo, especially when I'm competing with others for mobs.
I use it extensively on Gluth. We don't rely on hunters to kite zombie chow, as our huntards are terribad at kiting. Instead I slap on my tanking gear for extra dodge and run around, picking up spawning zombies with HoR and cementing my hold on them through the occasional Consecration. I also use it on 4 Horsemen to ensure that the Horseman I'm tanking doesn't ignore me completely.
I understand that it's brilliant in PVP - a taunt that actually does damage, preventing rogues from stealthing - and I'm keen to test the report that it breaks through Divine Shield, preventing bubble hearths. Now if only it interrupted casting...
Beacon of Light
Four major changes to paladin healing have challenged me this expansion:
1) The need to judge,
2) The newfound viability of Holy Shock as a healing spell,
3) Sacred Shield, and
4) Beacon of Light.
Of these changes, Beacon of Light has forced me to rethink how I heal the most. Beacon of Light effectively forks your heal onto a second target, healing it for up to however much your first heal landed for. So if you had your Beacon of Light on Target B while you healed Target A, Target B would receive heals up to however much Target A was healed for.
Say, for example, that my main tank, Azmuth, was standing in front of a boss mob. Az has 29,000 hit points and the boss hits for around 6,000 on plate. Behind the boss is one of my melee DPS, Malago, who has 18,000 hit points. Unfortunately, this boss casts a spell which does 10,000 damage to a melee player in range. So Az gets hit for 6,000, bringing him down to 23,000, while Mal gets hit for 10,000, bringing him down to 8,000 hit points.
Let's say I had my Beacon of Light on Malago. If I threw a heal on Azmuth for 10,000, that would heal him back to full - wasting 4,000 hit points (overheal). Malago would not be healed to full, as he only receives 6,000 hit points back. So now I have a healing deficit; I need to throw another heal on Malago to make up the gap. This would be remedied by putting Beacon of Light on Az and healing Malago instead.
This is why Beacon of Light messes me up so badly. In order to know how to maximize my healing output, I need to be deeply aware of the fight mechanics. I need to know who will be taking damage - and how much - so I don't waste my Beacon on someone who won't be getting hurt anyway. If I shift my healing target, I waste one GCD on transferring the Beacon to someone else. More often than not I find myself forgetting to refresh Beacon.
That said, Beacon is insanely powerful, although I often wish they'd made it a 2 or 3 minute buff instead (it's currently a 1 minute buff). I like having it in my arsenal. Maybe I just need to learn to use it better.
Where We Are
Raiding last weekend was very productive - six or seven attempts at Malygos in Eye of Eternity (none of which took us beyond Phase 2 due to the enrage timer), then an eleven hour run in Naxxramas which spread across two days. Avierra walked away with three new epics (four if you count the one I bought with Emblems of Heroism). It looks very much like I'll be healing for the foreseeable future; it took a failed Culling of Stratholme run to show me that while I'd gotten much better as a tank, I'd let my healing skills deteriorate over the past few months.
Naxxramas is far from being on farm, although we're making real progress in cutting down the amount of time we're spending in there. My goal this weekend is to cut down our Naxx time to 9 hours - 4 hours for the first three wings, 5 for the last two. Already we're starting to DE gear that no one wants to loot, a clear sign of content on farm. Given our gear, though, we're underperforming - Be Imba says we should be farming Malygos right now, and looking at our Armory profiles, we definitely should be doing harder content.
I'm skipping instances this week in favor of farming - this past weekend cost me nearly all my gold after I bought enchants for nearly all my gear. I'm not done yet, though - my War Mace of Unrequited Love is still unenchanted. I spent most of last night farming gold, and I'm finally back to 500g; I expect to be at 1.4k by the end of the week - a comfortable number, given that dual specs will cost 1k when they're finally patched in.
The Ulduar info I've been reading online is a bit daunting - we're not a hardcore raiding Guild, and I really don't know if we'll have the time to master Ulduar before the next tier of raid comes out. I'd really hate to miss Icecrown Citadel when it comes out, though, so it looks like we'll be spending more time in Ulduar than we are in Naxxramas. I may even have to remove Naxx from our raid schedules once we're more or less geared for Ulduar.
Naxxramas is far from being on farm, although we're making real progress in cutting down the amount of time we're spending in there. My goal this weekend is to cut down our Naxx time to 9 hours - 4 hours for the first three wings, 5 for the last two. Already we're starting to DE gear that no one wants to loot, a clear sign of content on farm. Given our gear, though, we're underperforming - Be Imba says we should be farming Malygos right now, and looking at our Armory profiles, we definitely should be doing harder content.
I'm skipping instances this week in favor of farming - this past weekend cost me nearly all my gold after I bought enchants for nearly all my gear. I'm not done yet, though - my War Mace of Unrequited Love is still unenchanted. I spent most of last night farming gold, and I'm finally back to 500g; I expect to be at 1.4k by the end of the week - a comfortable number, given that dual specs will cost 1k when they're finally patched in.
The Ulduar info I've been reading online is a bit daunting - we're not a hardcore raiding Guild, and I really don't know if we'll have the time to master Ulduar before the next tier of raid comes out. I'd really hate to miss Icecrown Citadel when it comes out, though, so it looks like we'll be spending more time in Ulduar than we are in Naxxramas. I may even have to remove Naxx from our raid schedules once we're more or less geared for Ulduar.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
King of Nothing
I've been out of the blogosphere for a while, and for that I apologize; there's just been too much going on for me to take a little while out to blog about it.
First off - Naxx CLEAR. After a marathon session last weekend in which we ran Spider, Plague and Military wings on Saturday and Construct and Frostwyrm wings on Sunday, we downed Kel'thuzad. Most of our raiders were in Naxx for eight to ten hours; I wasn't part of the Sapphiron kill as I had a family function to attend; when I returned to my computer, they needed me to step in and offtank for Kel'thuzad, which I gladly did.
The blue circular blob next to Adamae is a dead Lich; his demise and the subsequent looting was much enjoyed by all.
In the meanwhile, this is probably one of the last screenshots I'll be posting with the Asians sporting the < Guardians of Veeshan > tag. Things have gone from bad to worse with GoV, and a lot of issues have been raised on the forums regarding the guild's inability to progress in its raiding and our role in the issues. I must admit that the drama is a major part of why I haven't been blogging; I was largely unhappy with things that were going on with GoV and worried that the unhappiness would make its way into this blog.
In any event, things came to a head last night and we've since left en masse. We haven't decided on a new Guild name yet - we're currently guilded together in our bank alt guild so we have the benefit of Guild chat and some kind of Guild tag. We'll probably set up a new Guild in the coming weekend, as raiding with the < Bank of NiHao > tag is bound to raise a few eyebrows.
So that leaves me free but thankfully not alone; still with the friends with whom I set out to raid with at the start of the year. We're looking forward to Ulduar, and we'll be farming Naxx on a weekly basis now.
First off - Naxx CLEAR. After a marathon session last weekend in which we ran Spider, Plague and Military wings on Saturday and Construct and Frostwyrm wings on Sunday, we downed Kel'thuzad. Most of our raiders were in Naxx for eight to ten hours; I wasn't part of the Sapphiron kill as I had a family function to attend; when I returned to my computer, they needed me to step in and offtank for Kel'thuzad, which I gladly did.
The blue circular blob next to Adamae is a dead Lich; his demise and the subsequent looting was much enjoyed by all.
In the meanwhile, this is probably one of the last screenshots I'll be posting with the Asians sporting the < Guardians of Veeshan > tag. Things have gone from bad to worse with GoV, and a lot of issues have been raised on the forums regarding the guild's inability to progress in its raiding and our role in the issues. I must admit that the drama is a major part of why I haven't been blogging; I was largely unhappy with things that were going on with GoV and worried that the unhappiness would make its way into this blog.
In any event, things came to a head last night and we've since left en masse. We haven't decided on a new Guild name yet - we're currently guilded together in our bank alt guild so we have the benefit of Guild chat and some kind of Guild tag. We'll probably set up a new Guild in the coming weekend, as raiding with the < Bank of NiHao > tag is bound to raise a few eyebrows.
So that leaves me free but thankfully not alone; still with the friends with whom I set out to raid with at the start of the year. We're looking forward to Ulduar, and we'll be farming Naxx on a weekly basis now.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
A quick post
Apologies for the delays in posting, but over the past couple of weeks I've been carefully negotiating a job change. I'll be moving from my agency to a competitor in the next few weeks and so far, managing the shift has been somewhat challenging. Fortunately I have a ready stress reliever in the form of countless virtual villains to beat down.
The Asians (and Australians, omitted here only for the sake of brevity) have been quite busy raiding. Our first and last Asian Sartharion run surprised us immensely. We put together a 9-man group last Wednesday night in an effort to fit the Obsidian Sanctum into our raid schedule. Not only did we one-shot Sarth, we also managed to kill him in under thirty minutes. Our next Sarth attempt will be a Sarth+1 - without drakes up, it's clearly no challenge.
Also on the same night, we ran and cleared Archavon-10 (also with 9 in the raid) and downed Anub'rekhan, Grand Widow Faerlina and Noth the Plaguebringer in Naxx-10. Sunday afternoon, we put another group together to finish up Naxxramas. We downed Maexxna, Patchwerk, Hiegan the Unclean, Loatheb, and Instructor Razuvious, putting the Asians at 8/15 for Naxx-10.
Yes, that's correct - we're more than half done with Naxxramas.
I'm not entirely sold on farming VoA. It's certainly nice to farm the 2 badges a week that it can deliver, but the T7 drops are practically a lottery in which it is possible for no one to win. Given the time investment, I'd much rather be in Naxxramas or the Obsidian Sanctum. I've no compunctions about dropping it once Ulduar gets patched in.
So anyway, we have a run tonight, and I'm hopeful we can get 10 raiders together. I'm holding off on OS-10 until we can get a good group together, as I'd really like to start farming Sarth+1, so this will likely mean we'll start with Naxx-10 (Plague Wing). I'm also looking at a new strategy for Anub'rekhan, where the Anub tank basically just eats the Locust Swarm instead of kiting the boss.
Things are moving and I am glad.
The Asians (and Australians, omitted here only for the sake of brevity) have been quite busy raiding. Our first and last Asian Sartharion run surprised us immensely. We put together a 9-man group last Wednesday night in an effort to fit the Obsidian Sanctum into our raid schedule. Not only did we one-shot Sarth, we also managed to kill him in under thirty minutes. Our next Sarth attempt will be a Sarth+1 - without drakes up, it's clearly no challenge.
Also on the same night, we ran and cleared Archavon-10 (also with 9 in the raid) and downed Anub'rekhan, Grand Widow Faerlina and Noth the Plaguebringer in Naxx-10. Sunday afternoon, we put another group together to finish up Naxxramas. We downed Maexxna, Patchwerk, Hiegan the Unclean, Loatheb, and Instructor Razuvious, putting the Asians at 8/15 for Naxx-10.
Yes, that's correct - we're more than half done with Naxxramas.
I'm not entirely sold on farming VoA. It's certainly nice to farm the 2 badges a week that it can deliver, but the T7 drops are practically a lottery in which it is possible for no one to win. Given the time investment, I'd much rather be in Naxxramas or the Obsidian Sanctum. I've no compunctions about dropping it once Ulduar gets patched in.
So anyway, we have a run tonight, and I'm hopeful we can get 10 raiders together. I'm holding off on OS-10 until we can get a good group together, as I'd really like to start farming Sarth+1, so this will likely mean we'll start with Naxx-10 (Plague Wing). I'm also looking at a new strategy for Anub'rekhan, where the Anub tank basically just eats the Locust Swarm instead of kiting the boss.
Things are moving and I am glad.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Oops!
A couple of months ago I decided to change this blog's template and changed it through the Blogger management tool. It took me another half hour to put Wowhead integration back in (although, in fairness, I was doing that and a few other things at the same time.)
One of the things I forgot to put back into the blog is my Google Analytics tracking code. This blog has apparently been going for a couple of months now without any kind of analytics running on it.
What makes it especially embarrassing is that I handle Web analytics for an ad agency.
One of the things I forgot to put back into the blog is my Google Analytics tracking code. This blog has apparently been going for a couple of months now without any kind of analytics running on it.
What makes it especially embarrassing is that I handle Web analytics for an ad agency.
Monday, January 19, 2009
Progression
This Saturday morning, GoV as a whole ran Naxxramas-25 and wiped repeatedly on trash before pulling out and running to Obsidian Sanctum-25. With Sartharion down and four pieces of loot distributed to deserving Guildies, the raid officers called it a day. The end result - 4 Emblems of Valor for more than 3 hours of raiding.
On Saturday afternoon, the Asians and some friends went into Naxxramas-10 and downed Anub'rekhan and Noth the Plaguebringer. As we were worried we wouldn't have enough DPS (it was quite low on Noth), we didn't attempt Faerlina or Patchwerk. Instead, we marched into Heigan's room and wiped a few times in learning the Safety Dance. We came back the next afternoon, downed Patchwerk, then wiped around 7 or 8 times again on Heigan. These efforts cost me close to 80 gold in repairs and earned me exactly 3 Emblems of Heroism, although we were able to distribute 8 pieces of loot.
This is progression raiding.
I often forget that the dynamics of progression raiding are very different from the dynamics of farm raiding. At the end of Burning Crusade we were 8-manning Karazhan in Kara and badge purples; today we're struggling to clear trash in Naxxramas while other guilds are already farming Kel'thuzad.
This weekend I had so many tells coming in about the slow pace of raiding that I quite neglected to point out that the previous week, we'd failed to down Sartharion. The problem DPS'ers we had the previous week were doing much better this week.
Progression raiding is, by definition, slow. A boss that you down one week is not going to be as easy to down the next - and this isn't anyone's fault, it's just the way it is. There is a steep learning curve to raiding that turns off a lot of people.
This past week I opted to bench a raider who told a heroic instance group that s/he was not interested in downing a boss that had wiped them thrice so far, effectively putting a halt to the run. I did this because that attitude is anathema to progression - it is in no way acceptable. Never mind that I like the raider a great deal personally; progression is a harsh mistress.
What are the measures of progression? Some folks think it's loot or number of bosses downed. I think they're wrong. Loot is good, loot helps because it's a great multiplier - 1500 spellpower or attack power is going to provide more bang for your buck than 1200. But gear is always just a multiplier; the base factor is skill.
Number of bosses is a good way to keep track, but it's not the end goal of progression. And I do like seeing new boss fights. I haven't had the pleasure of learning a 5-phase boss fight yet, but I'm looking forward to the challenge.
For me, progression is about becoming a better player. It's about learning new and better ways to do things. It's about the group striving together towards a shared goal. And it's about seeing your friends and companions get better in the pursuit of that goal.
This week I saw a lot of that, and I'm grateful and humbled to have been witness to it. My buddy Silverwisp, who was new to World of Warcraft until a few months ago, cranked out 1500 DPS at Patchwerk on his second day of raiding. Our Australian friends Damo and Elauris doubled their DPS in the span of a week. And Theramor, who until this weekend hadn't set foot in Naxxramas, went from being undergeared in level 70 purples to main-tanking Patchwerk. I should also mention Brutusk, who kept Thera alive all on his own - Plikta and I were busy healing Azmuth, who was forced to step into the main tank role after I respecced to Holy this week.
Raiding with people like this - with people who strive to be better players, and who are good companions to boot - makes it all worthwhile.
So this weekend I looted 4 Emblems of Valor and 3 Emblems of Heroism. We must have wiped twenty times in ten hours of raiding, and I know for a fact that I spent nearly 200 gold in repairs and consumables.
I still think I came out ahead.
On Saturday afternoon, the Asians and some friends went into Naxxramas-10 and downed Anub'rekhan and Noth the Plaguebringer. As we were worried we wouldn't have enough DPS (it was quite low on Noth), we didn't attempt Faerlina or Patchwerk. Instead, we marched into Heigan's room and wiped a few times in learning the Safety Dance. We came back the next afternoon, downed Patchwerk, then wiped around 7 or 8 times again on Heigan. These efforts cost me close to 80 gold in repairs and earned me exactly 3 Emblems of Heroism, although we were able to distribute 8 pieces of loot.
This is progression raiding.
I often forget that the dynamics of progression raiding are very different from the dynamics of farm raiding. At the end of Burning Crusade we were 8-manning Karazhan in Kara and badge purples; today we're struggling to clear trash in Naxxramas while other guilds are already farming Kel'thuzad.
This weekend I had so many tells coming in about the slow pace of raiding that I quite neglected to point out that the previous week, we'd failed to down Sartharion. The problem DPS'ers we had the previous week were doing much better this week.
Progression raiding is, by definition, slow. A boss that you down one week is not going to be as easy to down the next - and this isn't anyone's fault, it's just the way it is. There is a steep learning curve to raiding that turns off a lot of people.
This past week I opted to bench a raider who told a heroic instance group that s/he was not interested in downing a boss that had wiped them thrice so far, effectively putting a halt to the run. I did this because that attitude is anathema to progression - it is in no way acceptable. Never mind that I like the raider a great deal personally; progression is a harsh mistress.
What are the measures of progression? Some folks think it's loot or number of bosses downed. I think they're wrong. Loot is good, loot helps because it's a great multiplier - 1500 spellpower or attack power is going to provide more bang for your buck than 1200. But gear is always just a multiplier; the base factor is skill.
Number of bosses is a good way to keep track, but it's not the end goal of progression. And I do like seeing new boss fights. I haven't had the pleasure of learning a 5-phase boss fight yet, but I'm looking forward to the challenge.
For me, progression is about becoming a better player. It's about learning new and better ways to do things. It's about the group striving together towards a shared goal. And it's about seeing your friends and companions get better in the pursuit of that goal.
This week I saw a lot of that, and I'm grateful and humbled to have been witness to it. My buddy Silverwisp, who was new to World of Warcraft until a few months ago, cranked out 1500 DPS at Patchwerk on his second day of raiding. Our Australian friends Damo and Elauris doubled their DPS in the span of a week. And Theramor, who until this weekend hadn't set foot in Naxxramas, went from being undergeared in level 70 purples to main-tanking Patchwerk. I should also mention Brutusk, who kept Thera alive all on his own - Plikta and I were busy healing Azmuth, who was forced to step into the main tank role after I respecced to Holy this week.
Raiding with people like this - with people who strive to be better players, and who are good companions to boot - makes it all worthwhile.
So this weekend I looted 4 Emblems of Valor and 3 Emblems of Heroism. We must have wiped twenty times in ten hours of raiding, and I know for a fact that I spent nearly 200 gold in repairs and consumables.
I still think I came out ahead.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Seal and Judgement Effects for Raiding Paladins
Cross-posted to the GoV boards.
In Wrath of the Lich King, each paladin tree has a talent (or two) that affects the Judgement mechanic.
RETRIBUTION:
Judgements of the Wise: replenish mana upon cast of Judgement
Heart of the Crusader: increase critical chance against the Judged target by 3%
PROTECTION:
Judgements of the Just: reduce melee attack speed of target by 20%
HOLY:
Judgements of the Pure: increase caster haste by 15%
Of the three trees, two have effects dependent on the Judgement debuff remaining on the target. The third tree, Holy, does not modify the Judgement debuff, and instead buffs the caster.
In a case where multiple paladins are using the same Judgement on a single target, each consecutive Judgement will overwrite the previous Judgement on the target, including all additive effects. Here's an example:
Paladin A (protection paladin) casts Judgement of Light on Target X. Target X now attacks at 80% speed.
Paladin B (retribution paladin) casts Judgement of Light on Target X. Target X now attacks at 100% speed, but is 3% more likely to take critical damage.
Paladin C (holy paladin) casts Judgement of Light on Target X. Target X attacks at 100% speed with no additional chance to be critically hit.
This is why, in a raid environment, or even a party environment with multiple paladins, it is important that all paladins coordinate their judgements to maximize their effects.
PROTECTION
YOUR SEAL: Seal of Vengeance (Alliance) or Seal of Corruption (Horde)
Why: Seal of Vengeance/Corruption ultimately deals more damage than Seal of Righteousness, allowing you to keep more threat over multiple mobs for longer periods of time regardless of whether or not you are active or incapacitated. I also suspect that striking multiple mobs via Hammer of the Righteous has a chance to apply the debuff to all affected targets.
YOU JUDGE: Judgement of Light
Why: While it will be nerfed in a future patch, Judgment of Light currently provides additional threat from its healing effect.
The 3.1 patch will remove the threat effect from Judgment of Light. The preferred Judgement will probably be Judgement of Wisdom, as mana regeneration also causes threat and provides another source of mana.
HOLY
YOUR SEAL: Seal of Light with the Glyph of Seal of Light
Why: Glyph of Seal of Light increases your healing effectiveness by a flat 5% while your Seal of Light is active, providing a fully scalable bonus to your healing regardless of effective spellpower.
YOU JUDGE: Judgment of Justice by default. Judgement of Light if no protection paladin will be using it (2nd priority). Judgement of Wisdom if no retribution paladins or mana regeneration mechanics are available.
Why: Even though Blizzard has made it attractive for Holy Paladins to judge, it's still a difficult spell to work into a healer's repertoire. Judgement of Justice doesn't really affect its target, but it does trigger Seals of the Pure.
If no protection paladins are available to judge Judgement of Light, use that instead to reduce the strain on healers. Judge Light over Wisdom unless there is a real need to use Wisdom instead - that is, when the healers are running out of mana. (In my experience, this is usually signifies a problem with the DPS, so if you're judging Wisdom at all please consider ending your run after that fight.)
RETRIBUTION
YOUR SEAL: Seal of the Martyr (Alliance) or Seal of Blood (Horde)
Why: Seal of the Martyr does more damage than Seal of Command, procs more often and scales better with attack power. In a raiding environment, you should not take significant amounts of damage from the seal due to Judgement of Light and splash-heal effects (which will restore your mana as well).
YOU JUDGE: Judgement of Wisdom by default, Judgement of Light if no protection paladin is available
Why: Judgement of Wisdom provides mana over and above that provided by Judgements of the Wise and increases the retribution paladin's raid utility.
If no protection paladin is available, Judgement of Light is the next best judgement, and should probably be the default judgement after the 3.1 patch is implemented. Judgement of Light mitigates the damage caused by Seal of the Martyr and provides raid utility. However, it is also increases threat by large amounts, and should therefore be used with caution.
In Wrath of the Lich King, each paladin tree has a talent (or two) that affects the Judgement mechanic.
RETRIBUTION:
Judgements of the Wise: replenish mana upon cast of Judgement
Heart of the Crusader: increase critical chance against the Judged target by 3%
PROTECTION:
Judgements of the Just: reduce melee attack speed of target by 20%
HOLY:
Judgements of the Pure: increase caster haste by 15%
Of the three trees, two have effects dependent on the Judgement debuff remaining on the target. The third tree, Holy, does not modify the Judgement debuff, and instead buffs the caster.
In a case where multiple paladins are using the same Judgement on a single target, each consecutive Judgement will overwrite the previous Judgement on the target, including all additive effects. Here's an example:
Paladin A (protection paladin) casts Judgement of Light on Target X. Target X now attacks at 80% speed.
Paladin B (retribution paladin) casts Judgement of Light on Target X. Target X now attacks at 100% speed, but is 3% more likely to take critical damage.
Paladin C (holy paladin) casts Judgement of Light on Target X. Target X attacks at 100% speed with no additional chance to be critically hit.
This is why, in a raid environment, or even a party environment with multiple paladins, it is important that all paladins coordinate their judgements to maximize their effects.
PROTECTION
YOUR SEAL: Seal of Vengeance (Alliance) or Seal of Corruption (Horde)
Why: Seal of Vengeance/Corruption ultimately deals more damage than Seal of Righteousness, allowing you to keep more threat over multiple mobs for longer periods of time regardless of whether or not you are active or incapacitated. I also suspect that striking multiple mobs via Hammer of the Righteous has a chance to apply the debuff to all affected targets.
YOU JUDGE: Judgement of Light
Why: While it will be nerfed in a future patch, Judgment of Light currently provides additional threat from its healing effect.
The 3.1 patch will remove the threat effect from Judgment of Light. The preferred Judgement will probably be Judgement of Wisdom, as mana regeneration also causes threat and provides another source of mana.
HOLY
YOUR SEAL: Seal of Light with the Glyph of Seal of Light
Why: Glyph of Seal of Light increases your healing effectiveness by a flat 5% while your Seal of Light is active, providing a fully scalable bonus to your healing regardless of effective spellpower.
YOU JUDGE: Judgment of Justice by default. Judgement of Light if no protection paladin will be using it (2nd priority). Judgement of Wisdom if no retribution paladins or mana regeneration mechanics are available.
Why: Even though Blizzard has made it attractive for Holy Paladins to judge, it's still a difficult spell to work into a healer's repertoire. Judgement of Justice doesn't really affect its target, but it does trigger Seals of the Pure.
If no protection paladins are available to judge Judgement of Light, use that instead to reduce the strain on healers. Judge Light over Wisdom unless there is a real need to use Wisdom instead - that is, when the healers are running out of mana. (In my experience, this is usually signifies a problem with the DPS, so if you're judging Wisdom at all please consider ending your run after that fight.)
RETRIBUTION
YOUR SEAL: Seal of the Martyr (Alliance) or Seal of Blood (Horde)
Why: Seal of the Martyr does more damage than Seal of Command, procs more often and scales better with attack power. In a raiding environment, you should not take significant amounts of damage from the seal due to Judgement of Light and splash-heal effects (which will restore your mana as well).
YOU JUDGE: Judgement of Wisdom by default, Judgement of Light if no protection paladin is available
Why: Judgement of Wisdom provides mana over and above that provided by Judgements of the Wise and increases the retribution paladin's raid utility.
If no protection paladin is available, Judgement of Light is the next best judgement, and should probably be the default judgement after the 3.1 patch is implemented. Judgement of Light mitigates the damage caused by Seal of the Martyr and provides raid utility. However, it is also increases threat by large amounts, and should therefore be used with caution.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Raiding 25s, Last Weekend's Fail
Once more, I didn't get to play a lot of World of Warcraft over the course of the last weekend as my wife and I went out of town with some friends to celebrate her birthday. On Saturday morning, however, GoV was able to make a Sartharion attempt with 22 raiders. I was lucky to be available for the run.
We got all 3 drakes down, but Sartharion himself was beyond our capabilities. We lacked healers, DPS, and most of all coordination - people were getting hit by Lava Walls despite repeated call-outs on Ventrilo. We had too many tanks as well, something that we urgently need to address if we want to progress.
Still, even though Sartharion managed to get the better of us this week, I have no doubts that we'll down him by next week, provided of course that we can muster up enough raiders to make another attempt.
After our Sartharion run the Asians re-formed for a Naxxramas attempt, this time with our Australian friends. We had to borrow a DPS (Fazzy) and a healer (Dhjey) from the guild at large. It was nice to step into Naxxramas with Damo, Elauris and Pinkmoon, although I have to admit that this was a hideously bad run. We couldn't even down Grand Widow Faerlina (Anub'rekhan we downed after four or five attempts).
Looking at our performance, it's pretty clear to me that we need to spend a bit more time beefing up our Aussie friends. Heroic runs are on the agenda this week, and plenty of them - we want everyone as ready for raiding as possible. I have no desire to repeat our poor showing once the weekend rolls around again.
We got all 3 drakes down, but Sartharion himself was beyond our capabilities. We lacked healers, DPS, and most of all coordination - people were getting hit by Lava Walls despite repeated call-outs on Ventrilo. We had too many tanks as well, something that we urgently need to address if we want to progress.
Still, even though Sartharion managed to get the better of us this week, I have no doubts that we'll down him by next week, provided of course that we can muster up enough raiders to make another attempt.
After our Sartharion run the Asians re-formed for a Naxxramas attempt, this time with our Australian friends. We had to borrow a DPS (Fazzy) and a healer (Dhjey) from the guild at large. It was nice to step into Naxxramas with Damo, Elauris and Pinkmoon, although I have to admit that this was a hideously bad run. We couldn't even down Grand Widow Faerlina (Anub'rekhan we downed after four or five attempts).
Looking at our performance, it's pretty clear to me that we need to spend a bit more time beefing up our Aussie friends. Heroic runs are on the agenda this week, and plenty of them - we want everyone as ready for raiding as possible. I have no desire to repeat our poor showing once the weekend rolls around again.
Monday, January 5, 2009
The End of (Holi)days
So I'm feeling much better now, thank you very much, and if I seem twitchy to you it's probably because I didn't really get my progression fix over the weekend. Sure, we downed a few bosses in Naxx, but that was to basically piss on the notion that we were finished as a raiding group. We didn't get to go back to finish the job and loot a few more epics.
If anything, the past couple of weeks have been more about connections than anything else. I got to hang out with Malago, who flew back home from Singapore for the holidays. I spent a little time with Rizal's friend Obispo and his cousin Calimdan, who are both awesome guys, and we can't wait till they hit 80. I got wasted at Rizal's wedding. I shared beers with Rothgarth and Silverwisp for Christmas.
And of course we sorted out some issues in the guild. I think the less said about that, the better, at least for now.
(Oh, and I ran into a superstar blogger in Dalaran - not that big a surprise, as Dalaran isn't a particularly large city, but still.)
I may have less than a thousand gold on my toons, but that doesn't mean I'm not rich. However much I cursed, scowled, frowned and Scrooged*, I still came away from the Yuletide break happier and therefore wealthier.
Now if I can only get my progression fix...
* Bah, humbug.
If anything, the past couple of weeks have been more about connections than anything else. I got to hang out with Malago, who flew back home from Singapore for the holidays. I spent a little time with Rizal's friend Obispo and his cousin Calimdan, who are both awesome guys, and we can't wait till they hit 80. I got wasted at Rizal's wedding. I shared beers with Rothgarth and Silverwisp for Christmas.
And of course we sorted out some issues in the guild. I think the less said about that, the better, at least for now.
(Oh, and I ran into a superstar blogger in Dalaran - not that big a surprise, as Dalaran isn't a particularly large city, but still.)
I may have less than a thousand gold on my toons, but that doesn't mean I'm not rich. However much I cursed, scowled, frowned and Scrooged*, I still came away from the Yuletide break happier and therefore wealthier.
Now if I can only get my progression fix...
* Bah, humbug.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
2009 begins!
First off, if you are one of the people who left GoV over the holiday season, fuck you very much.
As you can see, we're still in Naxxramas raiding. This was me (Avierra) and Azmuth tanking, Amihan, Brutusk and Plikta healing, and Rothgarth, Rizal, Grantilis, Silvertip and Malago on DPS. And yes, that is Patchwerk down - we took him down along with the entire Arachnid wing and Noth the Plaguebringer. One afternoon, we basically took a team of Naxx virgins and wiped out every boss we downed before you left. We didn't one-shot many of them, but these five bosses took us just over three hours. And we did it with a minimum of fuss, no Guild drama, or unnecessary chatter on Ventrilo.
Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
I've been quite irresponsible where this blog is concerned - I haven't been posting (or publishing my draft posts) as I was snowed under by work last December and by social demands over the holiday break. I haven't been able to articulate properly the joy that was two weeks of raiding into Naxxramas. Loot or no loot, it was great to be raiding again. (Well, I got some loot.)
Then on Christmas day, the Guild leader decided he was tired of GoV and /gquit, taking with him three of his closest friends. Two more followed shortly after - all level 80s with extensive raiding experience. They showed up in the ranks of Sovereign minutes later.
I wasn't around ASTIG when this happened to them (a large number defected to HP) so this is the first time I'm experiencing this kind of betrayal. If I sound bitter, it's because I am. As with many things about GoV, this Could Have Been Handled Much Better. Unfortunately, it wasn't, and the fallout is that many of my favorite people were left hurt and hanging without any kind of consolation.
So. That drama is still unfolding, and I doubt we've seen the last of it. The important thing is that we're still intact - the Invasion continues, and with more of us hitting 80 we're looking at more and more Invasion-led raids in the days to come.
Happy New Year, indeed.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
