Category: general

EZ-mode

Kurn / / apotheosis, general, raiding, ramblings

I’m sad. I really, really am.

We went into Naxx25 for the first time as a guild on Tuesday and one-shotted all the bosses in the Spider and Plague wings. And Razuvious only took 3 tries. (Our priests had fun trying to learn what to do.)

Where’s the work? Where are the wipes? The heart-breaking, soul-crushing 1% wipes?

I remember spending all night working to get Venoxis down. I remember several nights of Jek’lik and Mar’li getting the better of us.

I remember the amazing feeling of getting Lucifron down for the first time.

The epic feeling of getting Golemagg down when one of the OTs had died and the other dual-tanked them.

Vashj, pre-big boss nerf, dying on attempt #80-something.

THOSE were epic.

I mean, we didn’t even take kill shots, that’s how fast we were going.

And I KNOW we’re not that leet. I know we aren’t. We’re used to each other, for the most part, of course, so there’s that helping us out, but we still had people dead on Heigan. We’re not ultra uber. So it must be that the content is just EASY.

It’s kind of sad. I hope the other encounters are at least moderately more entertaining, if not more challenging.

What a long road it's been.

Kurn / / apotheosis, general, raiding, ramblings

The last few months have been trying. Since summer, we’ve had trouble filling raids more often than not, people dropping off the face of the game, constant recruitment drives, constant pushing.

Frankly, I’m exhausted.

But. It’s been worth it. 4/5 Hyjal and 5/9 BT pre-3.0.2 nerf.

And since then?

– Battle for Mount Hyjal won.

– RoS one-shotted.

– Mother Shahraz down.

– Council down.

– Illidan to 17%.

It’s been worth it.

Let’s do the math. Since June 1st, 2007, Apotheosis has downed:

KARAZHAN (11): Attumen, Moroes, Maiden, Opera (all three), Curator, Aran, Illhoof, Chess, Netherspite, Nightbane, Prince.

GRUUL’S LAIR (2): Maulgar, Gruul.

MAGTHERIDON’S LAIR (1): Magtheridon.

SERPENTSHRINE CAVERN (6): Hydross, Lurker, Tidewalker, Leotheras, Karathress, Vashj.

TEMPEST KEEP (4): Al’ar, Void Reaver, Solarian, Kael’thas.

HYJAL (5): Rage, Anetheron, Kaz’rogal, Azgalor, Archimonde.

BLACK TEMPLE (8): Naj’entus, Supremus, Akama, Gorefiend, Bloodboil, Reliquary of Souls, Mother Shahraz, Illidari Council.

That is THIRTY-SEVEN boss encounters in 17 months, or an average of about 2 bosses a month. Karazhan doesn’t really count, of course, but we all had to learn and farm various bosses over the course of the last 17 months.

We got Illidan to 17% last night. Standing there, looking at him, it occurred to me that we wouldn’t be there if not for every single person who’s every had Apotheosis under their name. Where would we be today if Grim and Guido hadn’t been there with us to clear T4 and the first half of SSC? Where would we be today if Fog and Netsuge and Kaiu hadn’t been there with us, showing up to raids to do whatever they could to help while helping to hammer out policy behind the scenes?

And what about all the new people? Where would we be today without the new folks who took a chance on us, coughed up 25 bucks and transferred?

The answer to all of those questions is… we wouldn’t be looking at Illidan again tonight. We would not be on the cusp of clearing Black Temple. We would not be able to even THINK about saying we achieved our primary raiding goal that we set when we first created the guild.

It promises to be a good evening. Apart from anything else… the zombies are gone. Thank God.

Wow.

Kurn / / general, guide, raiding

Found a new site (to me, anyways) in the last day or so, called TankingTips.com. For someone who has never played a prot warrior but has to lead said warriors through battle, it’s an AMAZING resource. And is obviously great for prot warriors, too!

Which is better, for example… The Brooch of Deftness or the Shattered Sun Pendant of Resolve? The answer to the age-old (well, since 2.4 anyways) question is here!

Chock-full of great, useful, smart information. Two thumbs up!

Beta!

Kurn / / general, ramblings

Thanks to a very kind and awesome friend, I have found myself in the Beta test for Wrath of the Lich King.

As such, I will be posting beta details and screenshots and stories here. However, I’ll do my best to keep spoilers under the “more” section of the post.

More soon!

Paladins and buffs and groups, oh my!

Kurn / / classes, general, guide, paladins, priests, raiding

So I realized today that it’s been forever since I updated this blog and didn’t talk about my guild. Back when I started it, I had all KINDS of conversational topics that I wanted to use to inform people about various misconceptions and such.

But I promptly forgot them all.

Until tonight! Tonight, I was reminded about paladins and their blessings and how they work completely differently from any other buff in the game, basically. I don’t generally think about this, because, well, I play a paladin daily. So I know how it works, and take for granted that others do too, because my guild was basically built on holy paladins being the core of the healers. So every learned about pally buffs early on.

But now, you see, I’ve taken my holy priest and gone forth and joined a raiding guild on Proudmoore. Without giving up my guild on Eldre’Thalas. In fact, Apotheosis (my E’T guild), is still my priority, but I thought I could relax and have fun with the priest by raiding content I already know in a guild that’s trying to work its way back to being 3/4 in TK and 5/6 of SSC.

The inspiration for today’s post came when I heard a mage calling for Salv on “Group 1” over Vent.

Continue reading “Paladins and buffs and groups, oh my!”

Things I've learned.

Kurn / / general, ramblings

Things I’ve learned in the past 36 hours:

– when I’m level 69, I am physically incapable of stepping away for longer than a few minutes before dinging 70.
– 900g for a flying mount and the training that goes with it is still substantial, even when you have over 2300g.
– it is likely a poor idea to drop herbalism for engineering unless you have all the mats you’ll need to grind engineering all the way to 350 so you can make your helm.
– Power Word: Shield is only castable on people in your party or raid. How did I get 4 70s without realizing this?
– There’s a Codex: Prayer of Fortitude III out there. Grump.

So yeah, I levelled my priest to 70. Actually, he’s my brother’s priest. He gave him to me at level 46 or something and by 55 or something, I wanted to kill myself if I played it anymore. So, Gneiss (as he was known) sat on the shelf for months. I got a friend into WoW so we levelled together for a bit before she totally, entirely surpassed me. :P And then I got to playing a bit on a RL friend’s server… and this friend suggested I just ninja-transfer the priest (who was on my account anyways) to her server, as Gneiss was 62 and her shammy was 61…

Two months later of off-again, on-again play, she has a 70 shammy and I have a 70 priest. I’m eager to really play him in 70 instances to see about healing that consists of more than “Flash of Light” and “Holy Light”. I actually went to Shadow Labs (first key frag — that questline is AWESOME experience if nothing else) when I was 68. Dinged 69 just before the first boss and had 0 trouble in my leet healing gear. Yeah, that was like, 800 +healing and a pitifully poor mana pool. Then again, my RL friend was on her shadow priest and we had a tank in full T5 tanking, plus a halfway competant mage pugger and a huntard who, despite the huntardation, knew how to trap things. The third boss there is my least favourite in that instance, as my pally, because of all the AOE damage, all the running…

Had 0 issues healing it at 69. None. I tossed up renews, prayer of mending, even used prayer of healing at one point. Didn’t need a mana potion or anything. Quite a nice change from the stress of healing it back in the ol’ days on my pally.

Badge gear vs. Tier gear

Kurn / / gear, general

So tonight, my guild got Fathom-Lord Karathress down for the second time. And, for the second time, no “of the Champion” tokens dropped. (You’d think out of six tokens dropping, at least one would be “of the Champion”, but no. You’d be wrong.)

I am fast-approaching 100 badges. I’m not a holy paladin who enjoys healing 5-mans or heroics. Karazhan and I have essentially parted ways. I get my badges by raiding, now, which I quite enjoy doing. I picked up 9 badges tonight, then added another two through dailies and I’m up to 69 (quit chuckling!) badges.

So because I’m at the point where, when our badge vendor on Eldre’Thalas eventually opens, I should have enough badges to replace Jade Ring of the Everliving with Anveena’s Touch. A clear upgrade, since it’s almost identical to the Jade Ring, but with actual stats.

I could save my badges for the Gavel of Naaru Blessings if I really wanted, but Vashj going down is just a matter of time, and she has a pretty sweet Lightfathom Scepter. So, assuming I don’t want to save up for the mace… should I drop 100 badges on Greaves of Pacification?

I want my T5 set bonus. Quite badly.

(4) Set: Your critical heals from Flash of Light and Holy Light reduce the cast time of your next Holy Light spell by 0.5 sec for 10 sec. This effect cannot occur more than once per minute.

Seriously? A 1.5 second Holy Light for 10 seconds? Once per minute? That’s just disgustingly great.

However, not getting my pants yet again made me look at the numbers. Obviously, with 4 pieces of Tier 5, the Crystalforge Leggings are superior. But otherwise, properly gemmed and threaded, the badge pants are kind of frickin’ awesome.

Total of 176 healing, 12 mp5, 34 spell crit and 36 int on the T5 pants, compared to 181 healing, 17mp5 and 47 int on the badge pants.

More healing, a substantial amount of mp5 and 11 more int, which is 165 more mana, not to mention more healing due to my talents.

But what about that pesky 34 spell crit? That’s 1.45% at level 70, which would boost me from 20.95% holy crit (unbuffed) to 22.4% holy crit (unbuffed). Which is 28.4% Holy Light crit. Which is frickin’ awesome with that T5 4-piece set bonus.

But on their own? I think they kind of fail to match up with the solid regen off the badge pants.

Coriel, at Blessing of Kings, talks about this briefly, but the article pre-dates 2.4 badge stuff.

Alternatively, I could hold out for the T5 pants and get Libram of Mending for 20 badges to aid with my regen, and still upgrade my ring as soon as the vendor opens, like I planned to.

I’ll keep you folks updated on my decision, but you’re free to leave a comment with any advice. :)

Lady Vashj.

Kurn / / apotheosis, general

My guild, Apotheosis, had its first few attempts on Lady Vashj last Thursday and I am up at this obscene hour (6:17am) trying to take the raiders who signed up and organize them into some sort of awesome killing machine by trying to figure out raid placement about 13.5 hours before the raid even starts.

We got her to 60% on two of our four attempts on Thursday and found that very encouraging. Elementals died quickly, but I’d allocated way too much DPS for them, so we were more than a little screwed on the nagas and no one really paid much attention to the Striders.

Without a warlock with Curse of Exhaustion, I’ve pretty much decided that our best hunter will be the kiter. I’m pretty sure he thinks I’ve been joking when I’ve mentioned this, but oh no, I’m not. Distracting Shot, Arcane Shot, Serpent Sting and misdirects from our other hunter… well, we can definitely cross our fingers, can’t we? Given that we should have 7 tailors able to throw a net, 4-5 pallies to HoJ and a shadow priest mindflaying and (hopefully) blackouting, the hunter should do okay. With actual DPS assigned to the nagas, they shouldn’t be an issue either, and I’m hoping to see the start of Phase 3 during Sunday’s raid.

It’d be nice to have a fully-cleared SSC.