I got distracted today and didn’t get a chance to do pretty much anything WoW-related that I wanted to do.
Except that I wound up tanking a great deal in Mana-Tombs, Auchenai Crypts and Sethekk Halls. As a freaking warrior.
Without going into details about how it’s happened, I’ll just tell you why it’s happened.
My brother decided to level his druid to 80. He may want to bear tank in Cataclysm. Or play a rogue. He’s not sure yet.
His rogue is 71. Basically, he played the rogue until Magtheridon, then stopped playing entirely and then was bored one day and played the rogue and gained a level.
But his druid? Man, his druid has been at level 60 for YEARS. He did a little bit of Hellfire Peninsula on the druid — he tanked Blood Furnace and Ramps a couple of times, did a few quests. But he threw the druid over for the rogue and never looked back.
Until last week.
When they nerfed the experience required to get from 60-68 or whatever it is, my brother’s earned experience was suddenly one experience point away from 61. That means that the system won’t ding him automatically for having had more experience then required to ding, but it was clear that he was beyond the requirement. So it’s been a running joke for ages now that my brother’s one experience point away from 61.
Only he started to level.
Naturally, he demanded I level with him.
“HAH!” I laughed, triumphantly, “I don’t HAVE a character below 80 or above 17!”
So he went on a healing spree in his 5/8 Cenarion gear, learning how to heal again on the druid for the faster queues, because, frankly, his Warbear Woolies weren’t cutting it.
By last week, he was 64.
We then both remembered his warrior character, who was, coincidentally, also level 64.
So now I’m tanking for him and we’re level 67, never you quite mind exactly how. ;)
I’m actually enjoying tanking as a warrior because I have things like an interrupt, a sweet cooldown or two, and, let’s face, it Berserker Rage without needed to change to Berserker Stance is just ridiculously good. The only issue is the lack of, you know, Righteous Defense and a persistent 360 degree attack (Consecration, Swipe), but I’m managing with Thunderclap and Shockwave, which is pretty much FANTASTIC.
Plus, I know my brother knows how to heal. He healed in MC, ZG and AQ20. So the duo of Kurn and Fog healing and tanking lives — even if it’s me tanking and him healing. ;)
I’m not really doing it because I want a warrior or even want my brother to have a warrior, but rather so that my brother can actually get his druid up there and it’s just easier if it’s the two of us. We don’t really have heirlooms available to us since our 80s are split between 2-3 servers and the ones we have on Eldre’Thalas have virtually no badges. ;)
So we’re doing it relatively old-school, just chaining instances and doing the odd quest (hi, Ring of Blood, I still hate you).
Xmolder joined us on his hunter tonight and damn me, he does some awesome damage at 68/69.
Anyways, that’s what I’ve been doing on Eldre’Thalas the last few days. It’s been kind of fun. And ooooh, I get Commanding Shout next level! Where DO you get those wonderful toys, warriors?
By the way, I highly recommend AnnoyingBuffReminder for remembering to actually cast a shout and Vigilant to remind you to actually put Vigilance on someone.
More pally/healing stuff tomorrowish. :)
I still love VuhDo for all my buff/debuff/healing needs (barring pally power).
However, I was honestly expecting this post to be cringe worthy as Auch is when I stop leveling characters via te DF, and go and run Nagrand to hit 78. I hate Auch.
Tombs is ok, so long as no one decides to kill the tank/melee by aoeing down all the little worms at once.
Crypts I hate. With a passion. Massive amounts of trash for 2 boss fights, and the first one is just evil due to most people not knowing about the stupid casting speed debuff. Even at max range, healing that as a shamy sucks. Sure, it’s stupid easy as a druid, but as a shamy, it’s hell. Combine that with people not seeign the giant flare (or not knowing what it means), and healers that don’t pay attention at the end of the fight (massive bleed ftw?). Yah, I don’t like it.
The only fun part is the last room when you have a pally tank and a holy priest. Body and Soul + silyl amounts of AoE vs undead makes those skeletons fun.
Oh, and I forgot to mention how much I LOATH mobs that drop agro when I’m tanking. Stupid other skeletons.
Halls is, yet again, just long, lots of trash, and only 2 boss fights. Oh, and fear, lots and lots of fear. I hate fear (assuming no shaman).
However:
Yay for duo leveling! I always find it so much more fun than most things in the game.
Forgot to mention:
I love warrior tanking. The only thing I miss is having a ranged silence. Sure, LoS pulls work, but I always miss my shield, and having to remember that “no, you can’t just charge every pack, it’s bad, mmkay?”. That being said, the thing I always miss when on the paladin is the lack of a gap closer. I <3 charge. I <3 warbringer.
@thansal Man, I love Body & Soul on my priest for the reasons you listed and the fact that Paladin tanks also love having it.
My worst horror story from Tombs is when I was first healing on my Paladin (after some fubar mistakes in the Coilfang instances) and the warrior tank did not understand that kiting the exploding worms through his healer was a BAD THING. Goodbye manarz. I have a soft sport for the Consortium, though, so I rather like that instance.
Crypts and Halls are both awful. I agree so much.
Thanks for the shout-out, Kurn, but you didn’t need to put that “at 68/69.”
I do awesome damage all the time. ;)
@thansal Warriors do have a ranged silence. With the Gag Order talent, Heroic Throw will silence for 3 seconds. Typically long enough for a caster to get within melee range.
Oh, I know Fannon, I know.
I’m also level 72.
I still have 8 more levels till I can shut up the damn stupid casters. 8 more levels of pulling with my gun.
I have, unfortunately, stagnated on leveling my warrior, and really would like to get him up to 80 and geared out a bit, I just don’t know if I will before cata hits or not. Hell, I’m doing more work on my DK (who I really don’t like, but I want him leveled for cata as he is my scribe).
thansal – I never did really like the feel of Vuhdo. I’ve got Grid on all of my toons (even the warrior) but a dot representing Vigilance or a shout doesn’t have the same effect. It’s sort of like…
“Psst. Buff.”
vs.
“HEY DUMBASS, CAST A GODDAMN SHOUT.”
;D
The pain of Auchindoun instances is somewhat offset by running with my brother. I mean, they still suck beyond most, but at 68, I’m heading to Northrend. So we’re almost done with the craptastic places. ;)
Auchenai Crypts is the worst if only for the initial pull. All of these damn casters! I think I figured out the first pull, though.
I used to run in on my pally (holy in BC, of course) and Holy Wrath those skeles in the last room. :D So many numbers! haha.
I actually don’t mind Sethekk Halls as much as the others. I’m not sure why. I think Berserker Rage has something to do with it. ;)
Also, I don’t know what you’re talking about, charging every pack is AWESOME. :D Warbringer is the best thing ever. I can’t wait for Intervene so I can bounce around even more quickly!
Walks – Mana Wyrms ftmfl.
xmolder – fine, yes, at any level. ;)
Fannon – wtb level 80, pst!
I agree with you on Halls. I like the bosses, I like the feel, I like the looks, it’s just feels like such a let down due to being stupid long and having all of 2 bosses.
Yes, Crypts sucks. 2 bosses, one annoying as sin, one uninteresting. The WORST pull in the world (gods I hate that first pull!), and adds that drop agro. I HATE adds that drop aggro. I’m fine with untauntable adds (read traps in ICC), but if I’m doing my job right, don’t RANDOMLY PUNISH ME FOR IT! graaaaa. rage!
VuhDo works for me because it has a very nice buff tracker that I had been using on my healers for long enough that it just flowed into tanking as well.
The only annoyance addon I use (and LOVE) is reagent counter. It has the most ANNOYING ping and announce when you are low on reagents and are resting (aka, in a city). Oh, and it switches you to tracking reagent vendors at the same time. I <3 it. So hard. And when I first started playing the warrior I was thinking of something like it (possibly Power Auras) for tracking shouts, but I ended up fine with VuhDo.
Side note:
Don't charge the pack in front of miss split personality in Nexus. It's bad, mmmkay?
(I swear, I only did it ONCE!)
@thansal: Of course, I had forgotten that Heroic Throw is the last skill that a warrior learns. How much sense does that make, seriously? It’s not like a hard-hitting ranged attack would be useful while leveling, right?
And I’m Mr. Bad Warrior Tank… I charge just about everything. :)
thansal – I think Sethekk would have been about 100 times more palatable without the last room. Or only two packs in the last room instead of four and a pat. It just saps my will.
What’s wrong with charging that pack in the Nexus btw? I’m fairly sure I’ve done so on my bear…
Fannon – I use my bow, haha. Hunter instincts. :)
Well, the one time I charged that pack in Nex I pulled what’s her face with them :P
And thinking back I generally see warrior tanks pull with something ranged, wait a second and then charge them, so that’s what I have taken to doing now.
As for halls, yah that last room is a pain in the ass. You have the options of attempting to clear it quickly, and risking a fear into another pack or 2, OR clearing it slowly with lots of long pulls. Meh to both of them.