Month: April 2009

Ulduar: 2 Achievements

Kurn / / raiding, ramblings, ulduar

We walked into Ulduar and promptly got two achievements. And a legendary drop.

heroicshutout-041409-1005

emblemofconquest-041409-1006

flloot-041409-1006

I didn’t get the fragment, and I’m okay with that. It went to the priest class officer. That’s cool. I’m new to the guild, he isn’t. I do wish the distribution had been more openly discussed, but c’est la vie.

So we one-shotted Flame Leviathan and MISTAKENLY got the Heroic: Shutout achievement. That was fun.

We then got stuck in combat. For quite some time. And then began the wipes on Razorscale. We honestly think Razorscale is bugged because we got 3-4 mole machines of 3 adds, I think it was, something like 3 times before we could bring Razorscale down from the sky. I think our best attempt was about 70% and then half the raid was dead and she enraged, killing the rest of the raid.

Patch related issues:

– Grid’s aggro indicator was not working in the sense that I had to disable Grid on Flame Leviathan until I had a few minutes to re-enable Grid and then disable the aggro indicator.

– I want my new glyphs, dammit!

– XPerl needs an update to be posted to the curse site (I got it at wowace) so that people can right-click on others again to trade and stuff or to right-click on themselves to leave a group.

– I made just over 1000 gold by selling flasks and Shifting Twilight Opals. Paid for my dual spec quite nicely.

– I did Northrend Alchemy Research today. Nothing except two mixtures of Endless Rage. (4 Flasks of Endless Rage.) So don’t waste your herbs.

A moment of relief, and sadness.

Kurn / / healing, raiding, ramblings, ulduar

So I’m reading up on the Razorscale fight in Ulduar.

And I’m like: “Crap, crap, crap, I should have read about this sooner. I don’t know who to assign to what and … and.. wait… wait just a second here. I don’t have to assign anyone to anything. I’m not an officer. I’m not a guild master. I’m not a raid leader.”

Relief actually flooded my body. I get to stand there and be told who to heal. I haven’t done that in new content since the first few bosses in Karazhan, in March or April of 2007.

And then, I realized, with a bit of sadness, that I won’t be leading the charge through new content. I was usually a raid leader who’d done research on upcoming bosses. I’d sat there for hours, pouring over our roster and figuring out positions and jobs for Vashj. I told the healers where to go to begin for Karathress and who to switch off to once their tank was done tanking. I organized Bloodboil and eliminated cross-healing from that fight pretty much on my own, especially when I realized at least one of my officers was cross-healing.

I won’t need to worry about healers spreading out, the way I did for Azgalor and Anetheron. I won’t need to pick a warlock tank, if such a thing is necessary. I won’t need to do any number of a dozen things within a raid that I’ve always done when faced with new content. I haven’t had to do anything behind the scenes, either. I haven’t worried about policies or DKP resets or anything like that. The only thing I’ve had to say about the legendary mace drop is that I’m likely going to be interested in it, and that ultimately, so long as it betters the guild, it’s fine if I don’t get it.

It’s kind of sad, to be honest. I’m going to miss organizing people the way I did in T4, T5 and T6 content. I’m going to miss being the one to sit there and analyze the mistakes we made as leaders and the mistakes raiders made as cogs in the greater machine.

So Ulduar starts tonight. New content starts tonight. The Wrath equivalent of SSC/TK starts tonight. And while I’m totally ready for something new, I’m not sure I’m ready to not be someone to lead people through this. Which is funny, because I’m not ready to lead anyone through Ulduar yet.

What’s also new is that my current guild has the possibility of getting server-first kills. We’ve done Flame Leviathan on 10-man on the PTR. We one-shot him, once the PTR was stable. This is entirely new and foreign to me. My first guild started raiding ZG two months before Naxxramas came out. Apotheosis started raiding Karazhan well after SSC and TK had received nerfs. We’d only been raiding as a guild for 19 days before they removed attunement to SSC and TK.

I’ve ALWAYS been way behind in the progression game. We usually made up for it with some burst progression at the end, but we were almost always months behind top guilds. We were even a month behind in Wrath content.

Tonight, if the servers ever come up… I might be part of a server-first kill.

I kinda like that possibility. But I’m still kind of sad that I’m not leading the charge. I’m sure I’ll feel less sad about that and happier about being a cog in the machine after our first 15 Ulduar wipes.

Ugh, so tired.

Kurn / / gear, paladins, raiding, ramblings, ulduar

Tired, going to bed soon, but I wanted to gripe a little bit. It’s not a big deal, but just voicing my feelings and opinions will make me feel better.

Tonight, well, technically last night. Monday night. Anyways, we did Malygos. And the Elevated Lair Pauldrons dropped.

I have the T7.25 helm, shoulders, gloves and pants. I have the T7.1 (heroes) chest piece. I have, in case you can’t do the math, my four piece set bonus and I have equipped the best breastplate for me at this point in time.

Malygos loot is item level 226, as is Kel’Thuzad loot and some drops (2 drakes+) from Sartharion.

In Ulduar, it is important to wear all your highest item level gear for the Flame Leviathan fight. Even if it’s not your spec, even if it’s cloth and you can wear plate, item level stuff is important as it adds to your vehicle’s damage done and health.

Without knowing until after the raid that 3.1 was being deployed today, the 14th, I considered bidding on the shoulders. But they suck. No haste. No gem slots. And to keep my 4-piece bonus, I’d have to go back to wearing my heroes’ chest, which is really crappy compared to the chest off Sartharion.

But I was considering bidding on the shoulders for the Flame Leviathan fight. Ultimately, I didn’t want to waste my DKP (I’m already in the negatives) when I don’t have best-in-slot gear in all my slots. I could use a cloak upgrade, a trinket, a ring and, oh yeah, a MAIN HAND WEAPON. So I decided I’d pass on the shoulders.

And then got informed by the raid leader that if I didn’t have 226 level shoulders already, I should take them.

Take them? For one fight? Because God knows I will never wear them apart from that one fight. And you’re going to charge me 12.5 DKP for them, bringing me down to -45.5 DKP? When I have four upgrades from Naxx and Sarth I could actually use? When we’re not sure the patch is coming out this week?

As it happens, the patch is being deployed today and T7 DKP will be wiped and we’ll start earning T8 DKP. And we’re not going back to Naxxramas or Sarth or Maly, either. It’ll be all Ulduar. So I got a piece of loot, dipped even deeper into the negatives than I was, but all that will be wiped.

But I’m still a little cheesed off. What if I’d had to bid against someone for a main hand healing weapon off KT? Or the cloak off Sarth+2? What if I’d had to bid and then I’d lost because of this truly useless piece of gear?

I think the raid leaders should, for the most part, trust us to make wise gear choices. I understand a raid leader trying to ensure a smoother raid in new content, believe me, but I was a little cheesed off that a mage was trying to tell me what to do with my DKP with regards to my gear. 20mp5? REALLY? Ugh. I feel dirty even looking at them.

Then, to compound matters (all this after NOT succeeding on 6m Malygos), the port they put up outside was to freaking Ironforge. Thanks, guys.

So I hearthed, after thanking them sarcastically on Vent, and the mage raid leader was like “anyone who took the port to IF, there will be a port to Dalaran there in just a minute” and I was all “Already hearthed, thanks.”

And THEN, the thing that cracks me up, is that the mage raid leader then has the TEMERITY to ask me to go heal Sarth 10 with 3 drakes up.

Hi, you made me wipe 13 times for a total of over 120 gold in repairs tonight, not to mention 13 food buffs and over 130 symbols of kings. Thankfully, I used a flask. Then you told me how to spend my DKP and forced me to take a piece of crap pair of shoulders. Then your port brought me to frigging Ironforge, so I blew my hearth ANYWAYS. And then you have the nerve to ask me to go do something draining and, no doubt stressful, like Sarth 3D on 10-man?

Even if I HADN’T had studying to do for finals, even if I HADN’T had a killer headache, there was no chance in hell I would have healed for him.

Not that he’s a bad guy. I quite like him, actually. But wow, was I feeling bitchy last night. Not sure I’m entirely in the right, either, but I don’t think I’m entirely in the wrong.

Ulduar this week, raids on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Monday. Looking forward to it.

Heh.

Kurn / / paladins, ramblings

I should be writing or levelling the shammy or something remotely productive.

Instead, I specced ret, grabbed my crappy ret gear out of the bank and am currently on the bird to Light’s Hope so I can go in, clear Strat Live and then go through and clear Strat Undead. The first to complete the Strat achievement, the second for a shot at the mount. And all the while, collecting scourgestones and rep for the Argent Dawn.

I like Fridays.

Late-night, last-minute, unexpected run.

Kurn / / gear, paladins, raiding, ramblings

I logged on after the hockey game ended tonight, just to see what was up with my new guild. I guess I should stop saying “new guild”, considering I’ve been there for over a month now, but anyways.

Earlier in the day, I’d been playing with my prot set because I’m thinking that’ll be my dual spec. I’d even gone so far as to respec prot to get a good idea of all my stats. 24k health unbuffed, 22k armor, 20% dodge, 17% parry and 17% block. With 542 defense. Not too shabby for a holy paladin. I’d blown some Emblems of Valor on some upgrades (boots, necklace) and picked up some offspec gear in Naxx (shield, pants) so I was toying around with it all, and really, I’m kind of impressed.

So I logged on and I was like “haha, I’m still prot, that’s funny” and was just going about my business, pricing gems to cut and all… when a shadow priest in my guild is like “come heal 8 man Naxx?”

I laughed and responded I’d had very little sleep and was tired, but maybe next reset.

Long story short, 15 minutes of begging by a mage, the shadow priest… I ended up running to the Cathedral in SW and respeccing back to holy. Not only was it going to be 8-man Naxx, oh no. It was going to be … Undying.

Continue reading “Late-night, last-minute, unexpected run.”

Oof.

Kurn / / raiding, ramblings

When I first joined my new guild, I was sat out of “progression” fights, or the more difficult ones, anyways. That means Sapphiron and KT, Malygos and Sartharion with three drakes up.

The first reset, I was in for 3 wings of Naxx. The second reset, all of Naxx and Malygos. The third reset, all of Naxx, Maly and Sarth3D.

Since doing Sarth3D, my job has basically been to heal the living crap out of the tanks who are on the blazes. Also, not standing in bad shit, as per usual. Occasionally I then move to the main tank (on Sarth).

Thus far, not difficult, nothing to worry about.

Tonight, in possibly the most draining raid experience to date, I was one of two healers on the MT.

Not something I’d necessarily care to repeat, lemme tell ya. ;) I was really only on the MT due to a lack of holy or disc priests in the raid. We had one holy priest and then me for two “get out of jails”, as my raid leader puts it. Guardian Spirit and Hand of Sacrifice, which I still always want to call a blessing, combined with the tank’s leet DK cooldowns, was the plan.

Well, neither me nor the priest had ever healed the MT on Sarth3D, so we not only didn’t really know where to stand (to avoid tail lashes and breaths during lava walls) but we also weren’t sure when to blow our get out of jails. The tank whispered us to cue us to cast our abilities on the next flame breath cast we saw — which, of course, meant a focus window on Sarth.

Let me tell you… Watching:

– tank health

– own health

– chat window (for incoming whisper)

– direction of lava wall

– fissures

in addition to then watching the focus window for the next flame breath… not fun! At all! :)

I kind of jest. It was a really challenging night, since we also incorporated a few people in the fight who had never done it with us before, and me and the priest were new to our assignment, but we did get him down and we did learn where to stand and when to cast things and stuff. So it was a productive night. But I am so glad the GM opened up guild repairs from the bank because I died.. I think it was 23 times, total. I think that was over the course of 19 or 20 attempts? Like I said, it was a challenging night, which would have been a lot less so if only we’d had another holy or disc priest in the raid or had done what we normally did with the other drakes, too. I started the raid with 300 symbols of kings. I was down to 54 at the end of the night. (I was on kings for all 10 classes.)

Ultimately, thought, I kept my target up more often than I let him die and I pushed myself to the point where I actually had to take a mana potion. So it was a good night in that I was challenged and an exhausting night because I wish it hadn’t taken quite so many attempts. :)

I really do love this stupid game, 23 deaths on the night or not.