#SWTOR - Flashpoint Confusion

Okay, I know the rest of you have been running flashpoints since day one, but our guild just finally got our act together and organized something. We've been pretty casual along the way, just because most of us have a lot going on outside of gaming, but we knew we wanted to play together. Waiting has its perks, too. A lot of the bugs should be fixed by the time we get around to things.

All that being said, we found ourselves pretty clueless last night. The SWTOR heroic modes seem a bit confusing. How do you turn on HM's? Which flashpoints actually have an HM? Do you have to run something first before being able to turn on the HM?

All of these answers are pretty readily available with a bit of Google searching. I think we sort of know what we're doing now, but it was a pain to have to go searching. Why couldn't this information be easily accessible in the game? We have a codex. Is it in there and we just couldn't find it?

And where is the HM switch? We randomly chose to do Red Reaper. Does that one have a HM? Some of us had never run it, so we did normal mode first. After that... ???

What I think is supposed to happen is that after you've unlocked the HM, the option appears under the right click menu of your portrait allowing you to switch on HM. Why can't it just be there all the time, but grayed out. Then, on mouse-over it could tell you: 1. No HM available or 2. HM locked until you do it on normal mode. Put the info right there. I don't remember all the things I've done/not done.

Am I just missing the easy button, or could the UI really use some help in this area? What do those of you who are, by now, familiar with HM's think?

The FP itself was fine. Fun, reasonably quick. There were a few tricky mechanic fights at the end. It was good to see it on NM first.

Tonight or next week we'll probably head out to Ilum for the level 50 NM FPs. Finding the entrance to some of these is a bit confusing, too. Which ones are on the fleet? Which aren't? I guess I wish there were a simple list on the codex with locations and modes available. Sort of like what they have for Ops (the lockout list). Why not?

In the absence of a dungeon finder, I'd at least like a clear list. Is that too much to ask?

(Edit: Got this great link in comments. Pretty much exactly what I needed. Awesome graphic! Thanks to Mythbusting for the link.)

My Crazy Dream: PvE Arenas

The more that I play 2v2 arenas, the more my issues with the current PvE gearing solidify.  It seems strange to find PvE clarity through PvP, but I suppose it simply serves to highlight that Blizz can still do things completely right.  And make no mistake, I think the current gearing path for PvP is completely right.  Sure we had that slight snafu during the transition from season 9 to season 10.  But if you throw that bit of confusion out (which we were probably over-compensated for anyway), it's really proven to be a pretty good system.

I wish I could say the same for PvE.  The word painful comes to mind, and that's it.  What I think Blizzard forgot is that we enjoy getting new gear.  That's part of the... what's that word?  Oh yeah.  Fun.  Gearing is fun.  Yet, the whole expansion has been focused on limiting the speed of gearing.  We've been forced to throttle our fun, lest we exhaust it too soon.

I understand why they slowed us down, but I'm not sure that it's been done evenly.  The more I play arenas, the more I believe that PvP has hit the nail on the head, while PvE has missed the mark... by about a week.  I would conjecture that what takes me one night of casual play to accomplish in PvP, takes me a week in PvE.

I guess my main complaint is simply that PvE gearing is too slow and arduous.  That is to say, I don't feel like I'm adequately rewarded for my time and effort spent.  Spend two hours playing arenas, and you can cap your CP for the week.  Spend two hours running dungeons, and you can get two done... if you're lucky.  And what is that?  ~300 VP on a good day?  Compared to ~1200 CP.  And we're not even "killing it" in arenas.  We lose as much as we win.  I'm sure we could cap a lot faster.

The difference, as I see it, is that I can put in a good two hours of playing, cap out for the week, and net myself a gear upgrade (Or significantly closer to one.  Some are more expensive.  Like weapons.  And I'm totally okay with that).  To get the same treatment from PvE, I basically need to run each day of the week for two hours.  Hardly equivalent.

And I know, we're supposed to be raiding to get gear upgrades.  But the VP isn't exactly falling from the sky there either.  Also, the loot tables seem horribly tuned.  We routinely get drops we can't use.  Or the same drops we got last night.  Or the same slot that dropped from the last boss.  I mean I'm sure it's not "by design," but it certainly feels that way a lot more, doesn't it?

In Wrath, there were always one or two slots (I would argue now there are like 4 or 5, but let's throw that one out for the moment) that were hard to get.  And you could chain run the super-quick heroics, be rewarded with a good (it seemed) number of token points, and fill a lot of your slots with purchased gear.  Now, I can agree that it led to some crazy patterns of running and gearing out super quick.  So I'm fine with capping.  I just want a fun way to reach the cap, and the current answer of heroics are not it.  Raids aren't really cutting either, though maybe they're working on that with all the nerfs.

Here's what I know.  As a player and long time customer, I'm really looking forward to arenas tonight.  I've been capped all week, and that has simply built my anticipation.  They're getting the same money from me whether I log on Tuesday excited, or log on Saturday frustrated with the same troll-roics I've been running each day.  Wouldn't you rather have an excited customer?  And I have to believe a lot of that is simply due to the feeling that I can get somewhere in PvP.  It has been tuned correctly, in my opinion (as far as gearing goes... class balance is a whole 'nother post).

So what would I like to see?  I do have an idea.  I always try to have an idea when I whine.  Try this one on for size...

While we all hated the idea of a one room raid (ToC), I don't think we similarly hated the idea of one room dungeons (think Violet Hold, but there really hasn't been one of these in each expansion).  Let's take that assumption and run with it.  Arena-ize it, if you will.  Arenas are fun because you can queue up, be thrown right in to the mix, be done in 10-15 with a moderate reward.  They're a quick fix, balanced nicely with other, longer options.

I think we need that option on the PvE side.  We need a PvE arena.  Want to be radical?  Make it 2vB, or 3vB, or 5vB options.  Throw in a random boss.  Scale the health depending on the players, but don't change the mechanics.  Part of the fun might be: do we go in with two DPS and try to burn and kite?  Do we need a tank?  How about a healer?  It breaks away from the holy trinity... and that's what I love about this idea.

Now, I grant that that would be a pretty ambitious projects so deep into an MMO's life-cycle.  It may not be worth it, from a business sense, to commit so many resources to a project.  So here's the lazy version: One random dungeon (maybe even a scaled raid?) boss, 5 players enter.  You get one shot.  If you wipe, you are awarded no points and my the Light have mercy on your soul.  Otherwise, you get a nice little hit of points.  No gold.  No drops.  Simply VP.  Maybe like 50 with a ~1200 cap.  It'd still be somewhat slower than arenas, but boy would I think that'd be fun.  And it'd give us a quick fix option that it seems we're lacking.

Is this a horrible idea?  Would it ruin some aspect that I'm not thinking off?  Let me know what you think.

Regarding the Dungeon Journal

I was reminded today by WoW Insider of the impending implementation of the fabled Dungeon Journal.  For those that may not have caught it, here is a brief run down.  As I understand it, the journal is meant to give you data on raid/dungeon bosses.  It will be part of the default UI and allow you to pull up a window which describes the basics about each encounter.  How, exactly, this is done remains to be seen.

I am unable to click through to the preview that Blizzard has provided today.  See the link in the WoW Insider article for more information.  All may be made clear in there.  This is an opinion piece, not a patch note debrief. 

I have several off-the-cuff thoughts about this that I wanted to share.  First, I guess I should explain that I am under the impression that this is a controversial addition.  I believe there are a lot of folks that disagree with the journal and believe it spoon feeds content or goes too far in a dumbing down or ruins the progression race.  I can see their point.  Yet, very simply, what is the different between having an in-game journal and allowing one to minimize a window to pull up a web browser.  (Mind you, the bleeding edge may not have access to them, but, heck, even then someone usually has a guide up as soon as there's been a realm first).  Just because a resource is available does not take away the free will to use it.  Should Blizzard instead lock players into the game, not allowing minimazation in and effort to prevent dumbing down?  The strats, the info, they're all already out there.  As far as I'm concerned, the only thing this addition is doing is providing and in-game alternative.

And guess what?  You can still choose not to use it!

Now, if it pops up automagically when you enter the room or something, then count me among the detractors.  So long as we are not forced to see anything but another button down there with the rest of them, I don't really think anyone can voice a true complaint.  Heck, I'll bet someone could/will make an addon that simply disables or removes the button from the a custom UI. 

From someone who is often looked upon to lead (be it in dungeons or raids), this is a godsend.  Depending on the actual information, of course.  I would love to have concrete data with regards to the range and nature of abilities.  Is it conic?  5 yard? 8? 10?  Avoidable or non?  It would be great if we're allowed to add our own notes.  Heck, it'd be great if we could share those too, but I think that's probably asking for too much.

Even if we just have a basic picture: "this is what he looks like and he does fire based attacks," I consider it a good thing.  You know we all tab out to wowhead or wowwiki or tankspot anyway.  Why not have something in-game?  In fact, I'd even wager that there are going to be key components missing that I wish were integrated that will still force raiders to minimize and use third party options.  Most of us will probably not even use it.  (This is based on the assumption that if you're out here, reading my blog, checking out stuff about the game... you probably are already comfortable with certain outside resources.  And what do the people purely in-game even care?)

There is one argument I could get on board with, and it's thus: there is absolutely no immersion to a dungeon journal.  I don't really see how it fits in lore-wise or any-other-wise.  How did we get all these sweet journals with all this great information?  Brann's been busy?  Thrall finally got a more detailed answer?  I'm not sure that this is a big issue though.  After all, immersion in WoW hasn't been dependent on things "making sense" for a long time.  It's just not a core concern of the game.  I'm okay with that.  If you're not, I doubt it's going to change in this MMO.  Look elsewhere.

There are some neat things I think they could do that might help with immersion (and maybe that bleeding edge thing).  What if the journal filled in over time, over the course of a server's progression.  Think about it.  Maybe right when the new stuff is release you only have, like, a message from Thrall saying: "Big fiery dude... go get 'em!"  Then, as we start getting realm firsts, it fills in.  Blizzard could even do clever notes from key characters in the story like from Jaina: "Guy sprays a cone like I did when Theramore was flooding."  Or Harrison Jones: "Watch the tail, kid."  Or Random Goblin #7: "Time is death, friend.  Better kill him in 8 minutes!"

Perhaps we could tie it to the individual.  Maybe the page is blank until you enter, then it fills out.  Maybe each time you enter you "discover" a new boss ability via "observation."  Maybe you give Warlocks the Libra spell from Final Fantasy.  Why not a spell?  Just sayin'. 

Anyway, I guess my point is that the base idea shouldn't really be that big of a deal.  Yet, I'm sure there are ways we'll all think of that could possibly provide for a smoother integration.  On the other hand, it's just another button.  If you don't like it, don't use it.  There are already better resources out there.  And if you want to go in blind and wipe a few times in trial and error, well... gl hf and all that jazz.  I have those days too.

Short Strats: Zul'Aman

Part two of Short Strats, courtesy of Finwe. For Zul'Gurub, see here. Here are the ones for Zul' Aman:

Zul'Aman

• Akil'zon (Eagle) - Spread out to minimize damage from Static Disruption. Dispel debuff on tank. Collapse on the tank when he casts Electrical Storm (then stand under cloud). Ranged dps focus on large eagle add when it spawns. Kill some non-elites if you get too many.
• Nalorakk (Bear) - Charges (Surge) furthest player causing massive damage debuff. If you get this, move toward boss until the debuff drops off. Brutal Strike on tank (80k) in troll form, bleeds and AOE silence in bear form.
• Jan'alai (Dragonhawk) - Move out of Flame Breath. Don't stand near Fire Bombs (5 yd radius). Let the hatchers break a few eggs, then kill them. AOE the hatchlings. At 35%, remaining eggs break open and must be killed. Enrage at 25%.
• Halazzi (Lynx) - Phase 1: Green puddles => heal (boss and players), position accordingly. Tranq his Enrage (if possible). Kill lightning totems. Dispel Flame Shock debuff. Phase 2 (66% & 33%): Focus DPS on the lynx, ignore the troll.
• Hex Lord Malacrass - Kill (or CC) adds first. Boss has occasional soul drain to gain player's powers. Be sure to interrupt heals. Melee watch out for thorns, consecrate, and whirlwind. Dispel debuffs. If you get Mark of Blood (DK), stop attacking.
• Daakara - Troll: Whirlwind. Grievous Throw debuff must be healed to full to dispel. Bear: Dispel Paralysis. Eagle: If you get Energy Storm, don't cast. Kill lightning totem. Lynx: Attacks random players. Kill adds. Dragonhawk: Spread out. Don't stand in fire.

Remember that these are meant to be quick snapshots of the boss... they're not necessarily full strats. You may need to discuss some of the finer details among your group, but hopefully this gets that conversation started (especially in PuGs!). See any points of improvement?

Short Strats: Zul'Gurub

I mentioned a while ago that a friend of mine, Finwe, has been keeping a collection of copy-and-paste-able strats. These can come in handy, and so he's passed along the ones he's compiled for the new five mans. I'll splitting them into two parts (by instance) and try to get both up today (bonus post!). So here they are (he did the strats, I did the formatting):

Zul'Gurub

• High Priest Venoxis (Snake) - Troll: Poison maze. Run apart to break Toxic Link. Interrupt Whispers. Snake: Don't stand in poison. No one (including tank) stand in front of boss during Breath of Hethiss. Stage: Run away from poison beams. Repeat until dead.
• Bloodlord Mandokir (Raptor) - Random Decapitate WILL kill you. Spirits will rez you. Everyone move away from Devastating Slam (frontal cone). After dismount, slow/stun and kill the raptor (and again as needed). Enrage at 20%.
• Edge of Madness (1) - 1 of 4 random bosses will spawn. Wushoolay: Run away from Lightning Rod. After charge, run away (15 yds). Move out of lightning clouds.
• Edge of Madness (2) - Renataki: 75%/25%, 100k Ambush on random player. 50%, run away from Thousand Blades. Enrage at 30%. Hazza'rah: Kite and kill adds. Gri'lek: Kite during fixate. Avoid Tremor and dispel Roots.
• High Priestess Kilnara (Panther) - Interrupt Tears of Blood. Can also interrupt Shadowbolt. Try to dodge the purple wave. Kill the panther packs 1 at a time before the boss hits 50%. Below 50%, run out of cave-ins. Boss gets stacking damage buff.
• Zanzil (Cauldrons) - Don't stand in fire. Interrupt some Shadowbolts. Zombies (red): use fire cauldron, and AOE them down. Berserkers (blue): use frost cauldron, and kite it (fixate). Graveyard Gas (green): use toxin cauldron.
• Jin'do the Godbreaker - Phase 1: Keep Jin'do out of deadzone. Group step into it when he casts Shadows of Hakkar. Phase 2: Move away from void crashes. Kill adds as needed. Kill chains. Group up on a chain and tank pulls troll away. Body Slam makes chain attackable

Remember that these are meant to be quick snapshots of the boss... they're not necessarily full strats. You may need to discuss some of the finer details among your group, but hopefully this gets that conversation started (especially in PuGs!). See any points of improvement?

Dungeon Quick Strats Part 2

Part two of Dungeon Quick Strats today, courtesy of Finwe. (For Part 1 see this post.) Here they are in no particular order (he did the strats, I did the formatting):

Halls of Origination

• Temple Guardian Anhuur: Run out of blue circles, healer dispel Divine Reckoning. Boss goes immune at 66% and 33%. Drop down on the right side of the platform and one dps will hit the lever. Move around to the left side, hit the lever, go back up and interrupt boss.
  
• Earthrager Ptah: Camel boss. Watch out for the cleave. Move out of ground spikes. Move away from quicksand and tornadoes. At 50%, adds will spawn. Tank and dps them, then back on the boss.
  
• Anraphet: Run out of the Alpha Beam void zones. Dispel Nemesis Strike on tank. Group up for aoe healing during Omega Stance. Periodically move boss to a new section of the room for easier movement.
  
• Isiset (W): Run away from beam. Turn to face away from boss during Supernova. Dispel Veil of Sky shield. Boss will split into three at 66% and 33%. First, dps down Astral Rain (starfall). 2nd time, dps down Celestial Call (summon adds).
  
• Ammunae (S): Ranged kill seedling pods. Kill Bloodpetal Blossom if it spawns. Kill spores; don't stand in spore clouds (can be used to damage mobs, though). DPS boss.
  
• Setesh (E): Run out of purple bubbles on floor. DPS void portals when they spawn. Tank adds. Kill or be ready to interrupt Void Seekers anti-magic prison (reduces healing by 100%). DPS ignore Sentinels.
  
• Rajh (N): Interrupt the Summon Sun Orb. Avoid fiery tornadoes; don't stand in fire. Run away from (or interrupt) Inferno Leap (flame pool on ground). Stack up for aoe healing during Blessing of the Sun (channeled).
  

Grim Batol

• General Umbriss: Run away from his charge. Heal tank above 90% for Bleeding Wound. Tank and melee run away from Ground Siege. Kite/burn trogg adds. Enrage at 30%.
  
• Dragon Ride: Spam 1 (attack) and target the mobs along the left side of the path. Do as much damage as possible to make the rest of the instance easier. Same mobs on the right side for the return trip.
  
• Forgemaster Throngus: Boss does weapon swaps. Swords, use tanking cooldowns. Mace, kite the boss. Shield, dps from behind. Stay out of the cave-in.
  
• Drahga Shadowburner: 2-phases. Drahga (phase 1,3) - DPS burn Invoked Flaming Spirit, run if he get's too close to you. Valiona (phase 2) - frontal cone attack and void zones.
  
• Erudax: On Shadow Gale, run into the eye of the storm and stay there. On tank knockback, let him come to you. DPS burn down adds. If someone is rooted, stay back 8 yards from them.
  

Deadmines

• Glubtok: Phase 1: Tank and spank, occasional aggro reset. Phase 2: At 50%, stand in front or behind boss to avoid Arcane Power. Stay away from rotating fire wall and fire/frost bombs on the floor. AOE adds. Arcane Power again near death.
  
• Helix Gearbreaker: Avoid bombs. If you get Chest Bomb, move away from the group. (Stand under the net to avoid fall damage.) Don't stand near the woodpile.
  
• Foe Reaper 5000: 1 DPS controls the Reaper. Use 1-1-2 rotation to keep the adds stunned at the bottom of the ramp. Tank boss partway up the ramp. Run away during Harvest (charge). Stay out of the whirlwind. Enrage at 40%.
  
• Admiral Ripsnarl: Charges random players and has a swipe attack. Boss disappears at 75%, 50%, 25% and spawns Vapors. If not killed, Vapors grow. Large Vapors cast a massive AOE. Near death, ignore vapors and burn the boss.
  
• "Captain" Cookie: Stack up near the boss. Tank eats all the food. If you're standing on some food, take a step to the side.
  
• Vanessa VanCleef: Glubtok: Avoid fire/ice, kill boss. Helix: Ignore spiders, dps boss. Reaper: Avoid sparks. Ripsnarl: Kill worgen, heal humans. VanCleef: Kill adds before boss. At 50%, 25%, 1%, click on ropes to avoid explosives.
  

Shadowfang Keep

• Baron Ashbury: Interrupt Pain and Suffering. Watch out for Wracking Pain debuff - increases shadow damage. Interrupt Stay of Execution (heal) after about 1 tick (and heal party above ~20k hp). He chains AoE below 20% - burn him down.
  
• Baron Silverlaine: When adds pop, focus DPS on them. Dispel the Cursed Veil debuff.
  
• Commander Springvale: Always kill adds first, and interrupt their Unholy Empowerment heal, if possible. The ghost has a short range aoe silence, so stay back. Move out of Desecration. Make sure boss faces away from the group.
  
• Lord Walden: Spread out, and run away from potions he throws at you. Move out of Ice Shards. For Mystery Toxin, green = go (keep moving), red = stop (don't move).
  
• Lord Godfrey: Pull boss down into the room and face him away from the group. During Pistol Barrage, all move behind boss and aoe ghouls. Decurse Cursed Bullets, if possible.
  

And that should cover the rest. See any errors? Let us know if you get some good use out of these. If they continue to be helpful, I may put them on a page at the left to make finding them easier. Also, if you have suggestions for alternates, feel free to submit them in comments. I'll include any of those when/if I get around to putting it on a page. Just make sure they're "paste-able."

Dungeon Quick Strats Part 1

A friend of mine, Finwe, has been keeping a collection of copy-and-paste-able strats. He'd been using these in his random dungeon groups pretty successfully when someone asked what the "addon" was. Sadly, only a clever collector, but he wanted to guest post the one-liners in case others may get some use of them. I'm splitting them into two parts, one today and one tomorrow, so here they are in no particular order (he did the strats, I did the formatting):

Blackrock Caverns

• Rom'ogg Bonecrusher: When he casts Quake, move out of the dust clouds and tank picks up the adds. Kill the adds. At 66% and 33%, he casts Chains of Woe. Burn down the chains, then everyone run out 20 yds before he casts Skullcracker.
• Corla: 3 people stand in purple beams. At 80 stacks, step out, wait for debuff to expire, then step back in and repeat. Boss casts Dark Command (fear), which must be interrupted.
• Karsh Steelbender: Tank pulls boss through the fire ~every 10 sec to keep flame debuff on boss. Fire causes AOE to group. If boss debuff gets above 15, let the stacks drop, causing adds, which must be kited by DPS. Adds leave flame puddles on death.
  
• Beauty: CC or kill the pups, then focus on boss. Stay behind them to avoid fire breath. Beauty has a random charge (doesn't drop aggro). Also be ready for aoe knockback and aoe fear.
• Ascendant Lord Obsidius: One DPS needs to kite the 3 adds around the room. (They cause a -healing debuff.) Other DPS should focus on the boss. At 66% and 33%, boss trades places with an add. Aggro is maintained, so just regroup and continue kiting.

Throne of Tides

• Lady Naz'jar: Don't stand in bad stuff (green and blue circles). Interrupt Shock Blast. Waterspout at 66% and 33%: Avoid cyclones. Kill caster adds first (CC one, if possible). Interrupt Chain Lightning. After adds die, move back to the boss.
• Commander Ulthok: Move boss slowly around the room. Don't stand in void zones. Dispel enrage, if possible. Decurse Fatigue, if possible. Tank can avoid Dark Fissure if you move out fast enough. Heal through Squeeze.
• Erunak Stonespeaker & Mindbender Ghur'sha: Phase 1 (Erunak): Move out of Earth Shards. Dispel Emberstrike debuff. Interrupt Lava Bolt. Phase 2 (Mindbender): Burn MC player to 50% (no DOTs!) Don't use magic DPS during Absorb Magic (heals boss). Move out of green fog.
  
• Ozumat: Phase 1: AOE murlocs. DPS and interrupt faceless ones. Tank kites behemoths. Phase 2: DPS sappers. Tank kites blight beasts. Don't stand in black stuff. Phase 3: Kill remaining adds during transition, then burn Ozumat (NE side of room).

Stonecore

• Corborus: Healer dispel Dampening Wave on tank. Move out of Crystal Barrage and ranged aoe the adds that spawn from it. When he goes underground, run away from the dust clouds and aoe the adds.
• Slabhide: Don't stand in front of him. He does NOT have a tail swipe. Don't stand in bad stuff. During Crystal Storm, use the rock slabs to break line-of-sight.
• Ozruk: Tank strafe to the side for Ground Slam. Everyone attack during Shield Spike and Bulwark to DOT yourself and prevent Paralyze (do not dispel this). Run away when he casts Paralyze to avoid Shatter (8 yd range). Enrage at 25%.
• High Priestess Azil: Interrupt Force Grip. Dispel Curse of Blood. Avoid Gravity Wells and rock shards (dust on the ground). Pull the adds through the gravity wells to damage them and aoe to finish them off.

Vortex Pinnacle

• Grand Vizier Ertan: Stack up close to the boss. Run out when he pulls the whirlwinds in. Healer face the tempest when he spawns.
• Altairus: Spread out and avoid the tornadoes. Try to stand with the wind at your back, if possible. Tank faces the boss downwind to help.
  
• Asaad: Spread out to minimize Chain Lightning. Jump when he casts Static Cling (if you get rooted, it must be dispelled). Everyone move inside the lightning triangle (Unstable Grounding Field).

Lost City of Tol'Vir

• General Husam: Don't stand in the yellow circles. Don't stand on an activated mine (middle glows yellow). Don't stand in the shockwave (big X on the ground). Move boss away from mines.
• High Prophet Barim: Phase 1 - Ranged kite/kill the phoenix. Ignore the egg. Don't stand in the fire. Don't stand in the beam. Tanking cooldowns during Fifty Lashes. Phase 2 - Kill the dark phoenix. Slow and kill the Soul Fragments.
  
• Lockmaw & Augh: Lockmaw - Stay away from tail. Spread out. Ranged attack Augh until he leaves. Nuke croc adds. Enrage at 30%. Augh - Kite during whirlwind. Use tanking cooldowns during Frenzy.
  
• Siamat: Phase 1 - Ignore boss. Tank big adds (Servants). Burn little adds (Minions). Use interrupts. Stay away from winds. Transition after 3 servants die. Phase 2 - Don't be near the edge of the platform. Ignore adds and kill boss.

That's it for today. See any errors? Let us know if you get some good use out of these. If they continue to be helpful, I may put them on a page at the left to make finding them easier.

The Satisfaction of a Successful PuG

We see a lot of horrible, no-good, very bad PuG stories. They pretty much range from atrocious to mildly irritating. Yet, good PuG stories seem few and far between. After all, it's not all that gripping to write: "Pugged last night, tank held aggro, healer healed, CC did their thang, bosses all died." Wahoo, right?

I'll be the first to admit: I don't pug a whole lot. I wouldn't say I'm scared of it, I just put a premium on my own time. It's sort of an extension of the if-you-don't-have-anything-nice-to-say-don't-say-anything rule for me. Basically, I know I'm going to be impatient and unforgiving in a pug. I don't really want to show up and deal with people playing sub-optimally, wasting time, and wiping often. It drives me nuts when someone stands in the fire and dies, or when DPS don't drop aggro or properly use their abilities.

In short: On my toon, "the patient" title is a lie.

So I don't put myself in that situation. I don't pug unless I'm in a really good mood and prepared to be patient with people. Which means I don't pug often. In fairness to others, I can't be throwing myself into situations where I know I'll behave like an asshat. I'm not judging right or wrong here, when it comes to playstyle. To each his/her own. If you enjoy playing sub-optimally and floundering around, more power to you. It just drives me nuts. I'm an engineer. I prize efficiency and pulling your weight in a team. It's a personal thing.

However, this is something about a successful pug experience that, in my mind, makes it all worth it. It's not about gear for me. I'm skilled enough that I can hold my own on a DPS meter without the best gear out there, and gear will come eventually. We're not on the bleeding edge. Heck, at the rate we're going right now with RL intrusions, we'll be lucky to get any of the raid content down before the next major patch.

To me, those times when you zone in with completely low, rock-bottom expectations, and are pleasantly surprised... those are special moments.

Take last night. It wasn't a true pug, but we were short a healer. So four of us went in and pugged a healer. Normally my self-imposed rule is "no pugging of healers or tanks" for obvious reasons. But I said "chuck it" last night. I was in a good mood. Our tank wasn't my precious Fuu, it was our newb tank (former healer) who recently switched for the guild and is still learning the ropes. It was a less than ideal situation, but I was with four good people I knew, and I figured we could deal with a sub-par healer.

Turned out, the healer we drew was pretty solid. There wasn't a whole lot of chatter. We threw out quick strats for the bosses, and lined them up and knocked them down. We even lost the tank halfway through one fight, but recovered and finished off the boss by ping-ponging with the remaining DPS. The pulls were messy, but not one lost their head and we never wiped. Not once. The run was the picture of efficiency. We knocked out the entire thing in 45 minutes (it was the wind heroic).

When the last boss fell and the little pop-up appeared, letting us know that we'd been rewarded our VP, I felt a deep sense of satisfaction at a job well done. I remember the feeling from my days spent involved with organized team sports. It's that same feeling you get after a solid win against a good team, when you're high-fiving each other and giving the ubiquitous butt-slap. I love that feeling (Yes, even the butt slapping).

We did not win the championship. This was just a regular season win. A good one, but a win all the same. And that feeling is a large part of why I still play this game. You can't get that from a single player game. Say what you want about how the social aspects of MMOs are dying. As long as there's still a way to attain the feeling of a successful PuG, they're offering something special.

Miscellaneous 4.0.6 Patch Notes

I'm going to try to cut this one down a bit to just what I feel are the important parts. Again, I'll add my own commentary in italics, but the meat of this post is poached from the full notes that I nabbed from the Zam feed. If you want to see the full thing, go there or subscribe.

Dungeons & Raids

• Level-85 players can now choose any normal dungeon via the Dungeon Finder. Choosing Random Dungeon will still not add Blackrock Caverns or Throne of the Tides into the rotation.
• Level-85 dungeon bosses in Lost City of the Tol'vir, Grim Batol, and Halls of Origination now drop 30 Justice Points each when killed.
• The daily Random Dungeon reward on normal difficulty has been increased to 140 Justice Points, up from 70.
• Players no longer need to discover Cataclysm dungeon entrances in order to access them via the Dungeon Finder.
• The Bastion of Twilight
  • Halfus Wyrmbreaker
    • Shadow Nova is now cast less frequently in 10-player modes to account for fewer available interrupts there.
    • The captured drakes in this encounter now apply Dragon's Vengeance when they are killed instead of when they are freed. To account for this change, the health and damage of the drakes has been reduced, and the damage bonus gained from Dragon's Vengeance has been increased.
• Blackrock Caverns
  • Beauty now spawns with only two pups in Heroic difficulty. Not to worry though, the missing pup has been adopted by a wonderful, if not insane family.
• Blackwing Descent
  • The Dwarven Golem Council will now go berserk after 10 minutes in Heroic difficulty.
  • Atramedes will now go berserk after 10 minutes in Heroic difficulty.
  • Maloriak
    • Increased the cast time of Release Aberrations.
    • Heroic: Decreased the health of the Vile Swill by 15%.
    • Heroic: Dark Sludge can now only target players.
• Deadmines
  • Foe Reaper 5000
    • Foe Reaper 5000's health has been reduced slightly. In addition, he now enrages at 40%, up from 30%.
    • When enraged, Molten Slag spawn 33% faster.
  • Ripsnarl
    • The ship teleporter now activates when Ripsnarl is first engaged, rather than when he is defeated.
  • Vanessa VanCleef
    • While in Helix's Nightmare during the Vanessa VanCleef encounter, Helix is now larger and a little easier to see.
    • The final rope swing while fighting Vanessa VanCleef has been removed. Players no longer need to swing off of the boat at the end of phase 3.
    • Some boat fires will now go out when Vanessa VanCleef is defeated, making it easier to get back onto the ship from the cavern entrance.
    • Vengeance of VanCleef has been redesigned. It is now a stacking buff that increases damage dealt, size, and attack speed, and stacks up to 40 times. Vanessa will begin casting this as soon as she jumps back onto the boat after detonating charges.
• Grim Batol
  • Faceless Corruptors now move 10% more slowly.
  • Players may still use spell and abilities while afflicted by Forgemaster Throngus's Impaling Slam.
  • Valiona's Devouring Flame damage has been reduced by 20%.
• Halls of Origination
  • The duration of the Flame Wardens' Raging Inferno has been reduced by 80%.
  • Anraphet's Nemesis Strike now does 75% of weapon damage, up from 50%. In addition, the damage-over-time effect applied by this ability does 15,000 damage every 2 seconds, up from 9,000.
  • Earthrager Ptah's Flame Bolt now deals more damage per second on Heroic difficulty.
  • Setesh seeks a portal every 25 seconds, up from 20.
• Lost City of the Tol'vir
  • Lockmaw no longer tolerates fighting in his treasure room.
• Shadowfang Keep
  • Baron Ashbury
    • Sadly, in his hubris he has forgotten how to Mend Rotten Flesh.
  • Lord Godfrey
    • He should now face a random target when casting Pistol Barrage.
  • Lord Walden
    • Conjure Poisonous Mixture now deals more initial damage.
    • Frost Mixture is now area-of-effect damage.
    • Toxic Catalyst now deals less damage over time.
• The Stonecore
  • Stonecore Earthshapers' Dust Storm does slightly less damage.
  • Corborus
    • The warning time for Thrashing Charge has been increased by 1 second. In addition, Thrashing Charge now happens 4 times, down from 5.
    • The visual for Rock Borers spawning during the submersion phase is now different from the Thrashing Charge visual.
  • High Priestess Azil
    • She grew! She's now 175% the size of a human, up from 125%.
    • Gravity Wells should kill Devout Followers more quickly.
    • The cast time of Force Grip is now 1.5 seconds, up from 1.
    • The size of the warning visual for Seismic Shard has been increased to more accurately reflect the area it affects.
  • Slabhide
    • The ground phase lasts longer and has fewer stalactites.
  • Ozruk
    • He now does more melee damage.
    • There is now a precast visual on the ground to make it clear how far away a player must get to be clear of Shatter.
    • The cast time of Shatter has been increased to 3 seconds, up from 2.5.
    • Shatter damage is now reduced by armor, but has been increased by 33.3% (repeating, of course) as a result.
• Throne of the Four Winds
  • Al’ Akir
    • Al'Akir's Electrocute can no longer be interrupted by Spell Reflection.
  • Conclave of Wind
    • Heroic: Slicing Gale debuff reduced from 10% per stack to 5%.
• Throne of the Tides
  • Commander Ulthok now does more melee damage.
  • The damage done by Lady Naz'jatar's Shock Blast and Naz'jar Tempest Witch Chain Lightning has been reduced.
  • Gilgoblin Poisoned Spear impact damage has been reduced slightly.
  • Tainted Sentries Swell damage has been reduced.
  • The damage of Blight of Ozumat has been reduced by 25% per stack.
• The Vortex Pinnacle
  • Creatures
    • Desperate Speed cast by Temple Adepts has had its duration reduced significantly.
  • Altairus
    • The visual effects in this encounter have been adjusted to make the wind direction easier to read.
    • Cyclones now knock players straight up, and players hit by a cyclone cannot be hit again for a few seconds.
  • Asaad
    • Skyfall Stars are now summoned to help him defeat players.
    • Static Cling has had its cast time increased to 1.25 seconds, up from 1.
  • Grand Vizier Ertan
    • His health has been reduced slightly.
    • He now knocks away players standing too close to him when he retracts his Cyclone Shield, which now inflicts Nature damage if it touches players.

Guilds

• The guild reward Armadillo Pup now requires revered faction instead of exalted.
• All guild banners now reward bonus reputation in addition to honor and experience.
• Guild bank vouchers that players unlock as guild rewards now correctly state that they can only be used by Guild Leaders.
• Once a guild hits level 23, the daily cap on experience gained is removed.
• Additional animations have been added to the Armadillo Pet guild reward.
• The guild faction requirement on the Guild Herald has been lowered to Revered reputation.
• We have redefined the definition of a Guild Group for 5-player dungeons.
  • If 3 out of 5 players in a group are members of the same guild, they will now be able to complete guild achievements and earn guild experience at 50% of the normal rate.
  • If 4 out of 5 players in a group are members of the same guild, they will now be able to complete guild achievements and earn guild experience at 100% of the normal rate.
  • If 5 out of 5 players in a group are members of the same guild, they will now be able to complete guild achievements and earn guild experience at 125% of the normal rate.
  • Also note that Heroic dungeons offer a 1.5x multiplier on all guild experience earned.
    
  
  

  Professions

  
  
• Find Herbs, Fish, and Minerals are no longer canceled upon entering an Arena or rated Battleground.
• A socket has been added to most crafted epic armor pieces that did not already have one.
• Alchemy
  • Alchemist's Stones for Agility, Strength, and Intellect have been added.
  • The number of herbs required to create flasks has been reduced, while the Volatile Life needed has been increased slightly.
  • The drops from Tiny Treasure Chests have been improved slightly.
• Archaeology
  • Archaeology fragments now have a hard cap of 200 per race. Players will not be able to collect additional fragments until they complete artifacts to take them down below 200 fragments. Players with more than 200 fragments will not lose additional fragments in 4.0.6, but in a future patch we may remove any fragments above 200.
  • Archaeology finds now grant a guaranteed skill point up to 50 skill, and then no longer grant skill gains, as opposed to granting up to 100 skill very slowly.
  • The sell value of all common artifacts has been doubled, while a small subset of common artifacts have had their sell value increased far beyond that.
• Cooking
  • Multiple spawn locations now exist for the Confectioner's Sugar (daily quest item) in Stormwind.
• Enchanting
  • Three new bracer enchants are available. They increase Agility by 50, Strength by 50, or Intellect by 50 respectively. Item level 300 or higher required. These new recipes are rare world drops.
  • Enchant Off-Handed - Superior Intellect now increases Intellect by 40, down from 100.
• Engineering
  • The Electrified Ether recipe now creates 2 to 3 Electrified Ether instead of 1.
  • The Heat-Treated Spinning Lure buff duration has been increased to 15 minutes, up from 5. In addition, the recipe now creates 2 at a time.
  • Mystic Cogwheel is a new Engineering Cogwheel gem which provides resilience rating and can be purchased from the Engineering vendor for 55 Honor Points.
  • Synapse Springs now increase Agility, Strength, or Intellect (whichever is highest for the character). In addition, the effect now lasts 10 seconds, down from 12.
  • Volatile Air now has an increased chance of dropping from rich mining nodes and Pyrite with the Electrostatic Condenser.
• Fishing
  • Rare fishing poles now have a chance to be found in the Bag of Fishing Treasures earned via the Stormwind and Orgrimmar Fishing daily quests.
• Jewelcrafting
  • Meta gems with the Chaotic and Relentless prefixes now have a requirement of 3 red gems.
  • New meta gems have been added: Agile Shadowspirit Diamond (Agility/3% critical damage), Reverberating Shadowspirit Diamond (Strength/3% critical damage), and Burning Shadowspirit Diamond (Intellect/3% critical damage). These new recipes are unbound and can drop from any Cataclysm creature. The new meta gems have a requirement of 3 red gems equipped.
  • Vivid Dream Emerald (new gem) provides resilience/spell penetration and can be purchased for 3 Illustrious Tokens.
  • Wrath of the Lich King purple, green, and orange gems have been increased in cost to match red, blue, and yellow epic gems (220 Justice Points). Burning Crusade epic gems have been increased in cost to match the most expensive Wrath of the Lich King gems.
• Leatherworking
  • The 500 to 510 skill-up range for Leatherworking has been improved.
• Tailoring
  • Darkglow Embroidery (Rank 2) now increases Spirit instead of restoring a flat amount of mana.
  • Illusionary Bag now has 26 slots.
• Profession Bug Fixes
  • See the fixes listed under the Items section.

Tol Barad

• Attacking forces will receive a 200% capture speed bonus when they control 2 keeps.
• Defending forces will receive a 200% capture speed bonus when they control all 3 keeps.
• Daily quest creatures, herbs, minerals, etc. will only spawn when Tol Barad is in the quest phase between battles. There will be 5-minute and 1-minute warnings before the quest phase ends. The quest phase ends 15 minutes before the battle for Tol Barad begins and queuing is made available. At that time any players in the daily micro dungeons will be ported just outside. This does not apply to Tol Barad Peninsula or the daily quests there.
• The weekly PvP quest "Victory in Tol Barad" now awards 200 Honor Points and 3 Tol Barad Commendations.
• Players can now see the status of Tol Barad on the World Map no matter where they are. The time to the next battle is displayed by zooming into the Tol Barad section of the map. The current controlling faction can be seen on the Eastern Kingdoms map.
• Quest turn-in NPCs have been added to Baradin Base Camp and Hellscream's Reach in Tol Barad Peninsula for the Tol Barad bonus quests. This will allow players to turn in these quests if the original quest givers in Tol Barad are not available.
• Kill credit for the Tol Barad bonus quest bosses will now be granted to players who have helped attack them, even if they are not in the same group. These bosses include Problim, Archmage Galus, Warden Silva, and Svarnos.

The Take Home
There's a lot here, so I'm going to keep it simple:

• Heroics got tweaked to be less brutal, but I would hesitate to use the word "nerf" since the majority of the changes seem to be well thought out. In addition, they made them a bit more rewarding in terms of JP (I wish we'd see a similar uptick in VP rewards).
  
• Guild Rep got a bit easier to earn with the redesign of group definitions.
• There were a couple nice things added to various professions, and some dependence on rarer materials was lessened.
  
• They've tried to make Tol Barad more compelling and fair. We'll see how it shakes out. In addition, they've made the questing better, especially with regards to the "quest bosses." You now just have to help kill them, even if you're not in a group.
  

Some nice changes, overall, I think. If I missed any big ones, hit it up in comments.

Pebble Approves!

Hey Gang!

So, back to live action! Our vacation was a great chance to unplug from all things interwebs. Which is really odd for Ful & I because we have smart phones, our jobs require us to be on the computer constantly, and we play an addictive MMO. Telling me that I can't do much more than play Plants verse Zombies for an entire week was pretty brutal. I mean, it's hard to pwn newbs when you're in the pool catchin some rays.

Anyways....

So, last night I got a chance to flex my tanking muscles in our weekly guild Heroic run. We were lucky and drew The Lost City of Tol'Vir. Which, by the way, if those stupid cat people can find it, how the hell did we lose it?! Harrison Jones must have been drunk: "Now where did I put that damn City....hic!"

So, we sauntered in, marked up the kitties, threw in the cat nip... wait... I mean the Frost Trap, and ripped it up. This place was rock solid. We downed the bosses with little issue. There was still a challenge but it wasn't eye bleeding pain. We zoned in and zoned out within an hour. It was a blast! Our clothies & hunter got a few upgrades, we all got a decent chunk of Guild XP/Rep, Faction Rep, Justice & Valor Points, and a Chaos Orb for our time spent. All and all, it felt like we had accomplished something. Something that we could have felt in Wrath long before now. Hell, by now, we would have ROFLStomped everything that Blizzard offered us and then we would all quit because we were bored out of our minds, sitting in Stormwind on our Welfare Epics on the biggest mount in the game blocking the Sun.

Cough*

Excuse me....

So, last night was the first night that I actually felt like we had mastered that Heroic. It felt really good and I believe that we've been able to hurdle the gearing issues that a few of our guildies have run into. As of right now, we have (from what I remember) four more Heroic Achievements to get for our guild. That would mean that we've, atleast, seen all of the new mechanics and all of the bosses once.

I've come to the realization: Our Small Guild could not have achieved this feat of strength individually. It was only achieved with the help of everyone collaborating and pooling there resources to assist everyone to get over the "Gear Wall". This was only possible with:

-Multiple Tailors using their cooldowns
-All unneeded Greens & blues disenchanted and donated back into the guild
-Buying Gem cuts for the masses & keeping the guild bank stockpiled
-Alchemists converting Volitle Lifes into needed Airs & Fires & making Flasks
-Blacksmiths making belt buckles that are still extremely expensive
-An ocean of Fishers catching and stuffing buckets of mats for our cooks
-A metric ton of chefs cooking up a storm for everyone's food buffs
-An extensive & organized Guild Bank full of useful mats for every walk of life (Leveling, Professions, Raiding, etc.)
-An entire guild full of people who are ready & willing to run anything with you (Dailies, heroics, regulars, Achievements, etc.)
-Alts that have turned into mules for professions that we're using for Guild Mains (Poor Abigora only sees the Jewelcrafter Daily & the occasional Mt. Hyjal to pwn some elementals)

I could sit here & swoon all day about my guild and how incredibly awesome they all are but I wont because, well, that's annoying. <3

TL;DR The New Changes to Guild Stuff is Awesome!

Pebble Approves!

yeah, I'll bet you were trying to figure out where the title came from.... whelp, there you have it.

Question for you dear reader: Has your guild changed & evolved with the introduction of the Guild Achievements? Has it proven to be a good or a bad thing?

<3 Your Friendly Neighborhood Fuubaar

Quick Post and Heroic "Nerf" Idea

We made it back, mostly in one piece. I've acquired the debuff: "Epic Double Ear Infection" which, which made me especially vulnerable to the AoE of the Airline Boss. You know the one, Pressure Drop. Yeah, awful. Nearly one shot me.

Luckily I hit up the healer yesterday and go some solid buff food. Told me it'll take 3 days before I stack enough immunity to clear the lingering stacks of Pressure Drop. Until then, it's like I'm leveling in Vashj'ir. Everything sounds so muffled and is just a bit wavy. Thus, this is the best, most entertaining analogy I can come up with.

In other news, they didn't Rogue-drop the patch on me while my back was turned. They also tweaked Fel Armor away from stupid mana and back toward good health. Much rejoicing.

Finally, I wanted to add one little idea to one of the discussions I've seen floating around the blogosphere. This one is relating to the "Heroics are Too Hard" conversation. There have been several good posts both for and against nerfing heroics. Before my brain blew up on the plane, I had this idea: Instead of trying to tweak the difficulty of the dungeons, why not simply fix the rewards to adhere better to the effort invested.

The problem, as I see it, is that we're still being rewarded as if heroics were as easy as they were in Wrath. The gearing path is still the same. Yet, we're not completing things with enough regularity to feel a sense of progress, leading to friction. I'm not sure that the issue is being able to fully finish heroics or not, it's being able to complete enough that you feel like you "got somewhere". Since heroics are clearly the desired path step in "gearing up", then getting somewhere is synonymous with getting gear.

Therefore, let's simply tweak the rewards so we can get gear just a bit faster. Doesn't have to be as fast and easy as Wrath. The heroics can retain their challenge. It just seems to me that we should be getting a bit more gear than we are. This could be remedied simply by increasing JP for each boss, decreasing JP piece costs, or increasing the number and rate of items that drop. It could be doing one of those things, or all of those things.

Along those lines, my favorite solution is this: Rework the daily dungeon reward to be given with the demise or a random boss. Instead of only being rewarded for a complete dungeon clear, since some dungeons can run quite long, make it trigger on the first or second boss. Something early and achievable in about an hour. I don't really want to see the heroics made simple, but I would like to feel like I accomplished something in an hour. A nice VP reward would help that, I think.

Sure, some PuGs might simply drop and quit after getting the VP Boss down, but some PuGs drop and quit now anyways. At least then everyone has gotten something.

Maybe this could be even easier to implement by simply adding another daily quest.  Like the weekly raid quest, perhaps this simply rotates and requires the "head" of a certain boss in exchange for VP.  Why not?  You wouldn't have to even muck with the LFD reward system then.  The amount of VP rewarded could be tweaked so we're looking at reliably getting maybe one piece a month.  I don't think that's too fast, but I do think there should be a path that rewards you for time spent.  Perhaps that's catering to casuals, but it really sucks when you spend your precious 2 hours some night beating your head against a middle boss in a dungeon and leave with nothing but a minuscule amount of JP to show for it (because heaven forbid anything but mail drops when you're 3 clothies, a leather, and plate wearer).  

I don't know, maybe there are pitfalls there I'm not thinking about in my muddled state.  It just seems to me that a big amount consternation is just do to lack of feeling like we're progressing.  There would seem to be better ways to ease this rather than ruining a challenge.  Not that I think any of the proposed "nerfs" necessarily do this.  They really seem to "walk the line" between outright nerfs and well-deserved changes.  I guess we'll see, but I just felt the urge to try to think outside the nerf-bat.

Treasure Hunter: Lost City Episode

There we were in the midst of anchient desert ruins, sand blowing at our feet, the boiling sun beating down our backs.  The strange, four legged manbeasts were trying to keep us from discovering the secrets of their Lost City, but we were well equipped adventurers.  We'd barely begun to sweat when we saw... it.

You see, we'd been progressing carefully, avoiding what we could and subduing what we could not avoid.  We used every trick at our disposal to keep the scuffles quiet and manageable, lest we become overwhelmed.  The five of us - two paladins, a priest, a mage, and, of course, a warlock - had many tricks at our disposal.  We'd seen a lot together: the destruction of an Old God in Ulduar, the glory of the Tournament in Icecrown, even the Fall of the Lich King in the Citadel.  Yet, nothing we'd seen could prepare us for... it.

(Dramatic Cat is jealous.)

It began with the pigmies.  Those stinkin' pigmies, ridin' on each other's shoulders and shit.  What do they think they're playing at, pretending to be one mob, yet really being three?  It's ludicrous I tell you!

But then, some things happened - there may have been drinking involved - and we were presented with the opportunity to view two rare beasts: The Sheepdoublepigmy and the Pigmysheeppigmy.  What those pigmies are doing with their sheep, I don't want to... I don't even... In the name of all that is...  Well, you look at the pictures!

Look closely now!

I want a sheep mount!

Now what?

I'll pass on the sheep sandwich.

Needless to say, it was difficult to focus on proper exploration with such shenanigans going on around us. This whole city and it's freaky sheep rituals can just stay lost!

My Most Hated Heroic Bosses

I was woken up by an earthquake this morning. I mentioned this because I live in central Indiana. We don't do earthquakes... until recently. My very first quake experience was two years ago with a 5.2 quake that was the strongest here in 40 years. Point being, we're pretty much quake newbs over here. We're like a shaman virgin, quaked for the very first time.

Okay, that was awful.  Don't lie, you groaned.

Maybe because quakes are so uncommon for us, there is phenomenon that happens whereby we take to the social media outlets, cell phones, and the like, calling everyone we know with the same damned question: "Did you feel that?"  I wonder if this is the same out on the West Coast.  Do you guys all call each other up and have a mini squee-fest?  Or are you more chill?  If I called you would you be like: "Yeah, it was a damn quake.  We all felt it.  That's sort of how these things work.  We don't live in Cloud City."  And then Lando would pop out, calling me a pirate and telling me how great it is to see me. 

Another groaner.  Get over it.  I was woken up by a frigging earthquake.  I'm a bit rattled.  (/groan)

In any case, I feel that this relates extremely loosely to WoW, in that we sort of react this way to the new heroics.  We're all calling each other up right now, saying: "Hey, did you see the tornado boss?  Yeah, that guy sucks.  And those snakes in Halls of Origination!  Why did it have to be snakes?"  To which I reply, "I don't know, Harrison, but I felt it too... in my repair bill!"

Okay, so that's a ludicrously loose lead-in.  I warned you this time.  Remember, I'm still a bit shaken.

So, today I wanted to start a "most hated" list for bosses in the new heroics.  We can call each other up, squee, swap survival strats (hide under a sturdy table!), and then get on with life.  After all, these will become trivial in like two or three months, right?  I mean, I've had two quakes in two years and I'm already starting to get used to them.  Fuu and I looked at each other in bed and said, "WTF was that?"  Then I replied, "Probably and earthquake," and rolled over.  I would not have given that answer two years ago.   In Indiana, that'd almost be like saying, "Probably an alien spaceship hijacked by terrorists and triggering an avalanche down the mountain.  The TSA hasn't gotten to inter-stellar flights yet."  And we'll be doing heroics far more often than once every two years.  Thus, they'll be old news in like... a month?  (Personally, I sort of hope they stay challenging for longer...)

Here's my two Most Hated:

1. Altairus in Vortex Pinnacle - Despite wanting to call him Altair (like form Assassin's Creed), this guy is no stealthy assassin.  He's just a straight-up killer.  With all his crazy tornadoes and shifting winds.  Ugh, what a fight.  Definitely my number 1 most hated.  It doesn't even matter that I can pull down a ridiculous 12-15k DPS by standing in the right wind location: we can't live through the fight.  I must admit, so far I've been successful in not getting knocked off the platform, but I can't say the same for my poor guildies.  Usually, it looks like an LSC (our guild) confetti storm about halfway through the fight.  We're getting better though.  Just... any tricks for this one?  Or do you just have to not fail?  Yeah, I've got nothing here.
2. Temple Guardian Anhuur in Halls of Origination - Or Snakes and Levers as my wife affectionately calls it.  Seemed easy to pop down and trip the levers on regular.  On heroic? Not so much.  10 seconds of lever pulling.  WTF is wrong with these levers?  We need to bring along some Lube of the Whale or something for fel's sake.  And those damned snakes hurt.  I actually have two suggestions for this though.  We started off where I jumped down, grabbed all the snakes, ported and ran like hell.  Problem was, the lever puller kept getting killed in between lever phases.  I think our healer was constantly playing catch-up due to splitting. So we took the whole group down, tank gathered the snakes, we nuked them, and then two of us stayed behind for lever duty while the rest busted ass up.  Worked well and we got by this guy.  Still, it was a pain.  

Those are my two most hated bosses right now.  What are yours?  We've been doing these and a guild and are all only slightly above the heroic "gear line", so I imagine this is as hard as it gets.  As we gear up, I'm sure we'll find these infinitely easier, but for now they're quite the challenge.  We also seem to get these same instances when trying to random.  Go figure.  I want to go back and visit Squidward in Throne of Tides. 

Do You Feel That?

Protection Paladin Rotation: Max Threat Verse Survivability

Hey Gang!

So, it's been some time now since 4.0.1 dropped and our new spells, Holy Power, etc. had thrown our original rotations into a Cement Mixer. For many of us, it felt very foreign to us because many of the things that we took as "sacred" are no more.

After hitting 85, training all of my new spells, I was anxious to see how all of these new spells fit together. We gained Inquisition at level 81. Which at first seems pretty much only useful for our Retribution pals. It's a DPS increase when you use Holy power and scales with how many stacks we had while using it. If you use it with all three stacks of Holy Power, Inquisition lasts for 12 seconds.

My first reaction was why do I want to waste my precious Holy Power on a Damage increase? I have two extremely powerful spells that I can choose to use instead. Shield of the Righteous that does huge amounts of single target threat (currently critting for almost 20k with three stacks) and putting up Holy Shield that increases the amount of damage I mitigate by 10% and Word of Glory that gives me a very free self healing. Why do I, as a tank, give two Kodo Poops about Inquisition? Well, after further reading over at my favorite Forums, I saw theorycrafters proposing that if you use Inquisition with 3 stacks of Holy power, it will last you 12 seconds. Our rotation, from start to finish, is only 9 seconds.

This got my brain rolling...

Well, if I could have Inquisition on for the duration of my rotation in all the while working my Holy Power back up, it will last me until I get back to hitting SotR again. My brain just exploded at the thought of all that delicious threat that I would be creating. Om nom nom!

But here's the beauty of this whole entire thing. Holy power takes 9 seconds to rack up to 3. Most fights don't last very long. 18 Seconds is like an eternity when it comes to mob & boss fights. Having to wait 18 seconds to have your Holy Shield up feels like having unprotected sex with strangers and then deciding mid way that you probably shouldn't be doing what you're doing...

/gross

So brain, how do we get to play with our "Holy Shit Threat Happy Fun Time" without feeling "unprotected" for 18 seconds?

The answer is Divine Plea! When you hit Divine Plea (if Talented... which you better have it talented or I'll be sad!) It gives you an automatic 3 stacks of Holy Power right away before ever having to do anything! Hurray!

What I found to be the best single target threat rotation to be:
(Glyphed: Focused Shield) Avengers Shield-Divine Plea-Inquisition-Crusader Strike-Judgement-Crusader Strike- AS/ (Holy Wrath if AS didn't proc or off Cooldown)- Crusader Strike- Shield of the Righteous (repeat until dead... not you! The Boss!)

With this rotation you are getting the full effect of Inquisition through your entire rotation and not having to wait the entire 18 seconds to get your Holy Shield up. Best of both worlds. With this kind of threat start, it would be extremely hard for anyone to pull it off of you. This is the Ultimate front loaded threat move. Hell throw in your Wings and you have become a monster! Even your trigger happy mage would be hard pressed to pry that Internet Dragon off of you. With this kind of a lead on your threat, letting Vengence kick in will only make the ride that much easier.

Now, if you are more interested in AoE instead of Single target. It's pretty easy to make a few minor changes. Unglyph your Avenger's Shield so you are hitting 3 targets instead of 1. Replace Crusader Strike with Hammer of the Righteous and use Holy Wrath & Consecrate in your "off times".  If mobs aren't hitting too hard, you could even change your Aura to Retribution (if you don't already have a Ret Pally with you).

If Survivability is what really butters your bread, then I suggest a different strategy. I would focus more on keeping up your Holy Shield up for that additional mitigation and spot healing with Word of Glory. Again, I would pop Divine Plea before the pull, Shoot the mob/boss, use Shield of the Righteous and go to town gaining back your Holy Power Stacks. Once to three, pop Word of Glory. This is really nice even if you are topped off because (again if you specced into it) will create a bubble with the over heals. Rotate Shield of the Righteous with Word of Glory and you should be golden. Healers will cheer & babes will weep at how awesome you are at Surviving the most brutal content that Cataclysm could throw at you.

Now get out there & make your healers proud!

/slaps you on the ass for good luck!

<3 Your Friendly Neightborhood Fuubaar

Aptly Named: Throne of Tides

Elkagorasa talked about it yesterday here, but I wanted to quickly share my experiences with the Throne of Tides.  Fuu and I teamed up with guildies to give a new dungeon a try.  At the time we were all level 81 and that means there were only two dungeon choices.  We settled on Throne of Tides.  We grouped up, then attempted to queue for it...  Wait, what is this?  Someone does not meet the requirements?  But we're all level 81 and still (at least partially) raid geared.  How can this be?

Recall that there is that little new criteria that you have to have discovered the entrance once before you'll be able to queue for a dungeon.  So our first adventure quickly became: how the fel do we get to this so-called Throne of Tides?  Fortunately, there are those among us that see large whirlpools and think "hey, I bet that'd be interesting to swim into."  Don't ask me why.  That person is not me.  I see giant swirling death.

So, fortunately, there was one among us that knew to use the huge oceanic toilet to get to the dungeon.  Yeah, the one smack in the middle of the Shimmering Expanse in Vash'jir.  You can't miss it.  Those cursed Naga are attempting to burrow into the Water Plane and all that jazz.

Having found the entrance, we proceeded to use the stone to summon folks like myself who were wary about said large vortex (also, who were not nearby).  Once the five of us were together, we ventured in.  The first thing that was said over vent: "Eww, tentacles".  Yes, there are two wavy tentacles that block off a side passageway each.  The initial path in this dungeon is straight ahead.  Some trash and a quick ride on a jellyfish brings you to a second level where you continue through several fights to the last room.  Killing the boss in there will send you back to the front, since the tentacles will have left, opening the final two wings.  We went right and then left, as I think you're supposed to do.  It can be a bit confusing, especially if, like us, you try to do it without consulting any online resources (but you're here now! ha ha!).

Elk does a great job of running through the bosses and important mobs in the bottom half of the post I linked above.  I'm not going to redo the good work.  I will say, however, that you can pretty much wing each of the fights.  Especially if you have DBM.  It'll warn you about the thingy that requires interrupting, as well as warn about some of the harder hitting abilities.  In part raid gear, part leveling gear, it was pretty easy, though not without some close calls.  A great first instance, say I.

There are two tips I want to give that may not be obvious.  The first is to use the teleporter to get back after the tentacles are gone.  There is a two-point teleporter in this dungeon.  Waiting on that damn jellyfish is stupid.  At least, we all got impatient.
The second is that after the final boss makes you huge, don't just stand around gawking at each other and going "well this is cool, but why do we still have a DoT on us?"  Because that's what we did.  We didn't see the huge sucker-mouth-thingy up on the wall that was spewing... ink (?) and death at us.   Since the debuff appears to stack, we were fighting a losing battle after we'd stood dumbstruck for half the fight.  We burned and, somehow, I was the only one left standing.  We still won though.  Just... look for the sucker mouth.  It's up on the wall.  Sucker mouth = bad.  Dunno how we missed it.

Finally, not really a tip but a general observation, we did make use of some CC and "old" tactics here.  We did a few LoS pulls.  We sheeped some things.  While we probably could have gotten by without CC, I think it definitely made things smoother.  I've definitely not been enticed to spec into fear yet, but I've found having my Succubus tends to be great as she'll pick out the rogue adds and seduce them.  Heck, sometimes we'd not be aware she had a caster all riled up on the other side of the room: "Oh, there's another add left."  Dirty, dirty Succubus.

So if you're looking to shuffle things up with a dungeon run, Throne of Tides is a great place to start.  Easily do-able for folks in the 80-82 range.  Good experience, some decent drops.  Nothing to write home about, but it gets the party started.  Rather well designed, visually appealing, and boss fights that are engaging without being gimmicky.  Just make sure you give yourself a swirly to get in.  Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to head to the RL throne room.

Fuubaar's Top 10 List of A.D.D. Crap To Do Before Cataclysm

Hey Gang!

As the mass majority of you out there are winding down waiting for Cataclysm news, you find yourself not logging into the World of Warcraft quite as often as you had before. I’ve compiled a list of things that I’m currently doing in-game to keep myself busy with goals. I’ve ranked them in the order of easiness (10 being the easiest while 1 is excruciatingly difficult & time consuming). I’ve also listed things that you can do by yourself (aka Solo). You are more than welcome / encouraged to do these tasks with friends to make them a lot more fun & fulfilling but, again, this is to fill up your own time because others aren’t logging on nearly as much. It sucks when you are in the middle of something and someone else ruins your plans.


10) Finish up the Argent Tournament: If you’re like me, you probably got very excited when ToC came out and felt the urge to Champion all of the Horde or Alliance cities. Well, if you’re also like me, you got through 2-3 cities before you lost interest. It’s probably been long enough by now that you’ve forgotten how truly boring it really is (see: ADD) and could force yourself to finish those up. Hell, just try to do one full round and see how it feels. If it still brings back painful memories, call it a loss and move on.

9) Northrend Reputation: I’m assuming that you’ve probably worn every tabard that you could get your grubby little hands on and are now exalted with every one of these factions. Well, what about the Factions that don’t give you a tabard? Go look; I’ll wait… yeah that’s what I thought! You aren’t quite done now are you? Get to it! Those Walrus men have many Wolvar puppies to steal!

8) Northrend Heroic Achievements: Many of us are quite ill at the thought of running more Random Heroics by now. As your gear goes up, the speed of bosses living goes way… way down. Like 30 seconds down. Like He spawns in an instance, and he dies instantly because you thought about running that heroic. I’ll bet that if you were to look at your Achievement Tab for Heroic Achievements, I’ll bet that there are more accomplished than you realized. Gather up some of your best friends & finish the remainder of those up! This shouldn’t be too terribly hard if you have the right people. Plus, you get a mount!

7) Kalimdor/ Eastern Kingdoms Dungeons: Let’s head to Vanilla shall we? Depending on when you started playing WoW, you’ve either blown so far past these instances that you’ve never set foot inside them, or it’s been so damn long ago that you’ve done these, that you might have forgotten the beauty that these old instances hold. Pull up your Classic Dungeon-master Achievements and start filling them in. This is going to require quite a bit of traveling on your end but if you have the flight paths, you could knock out every instance in a matter of hours. I would not only suggest figuring out what you need to run, but also figure out where they are located. This will really make your travel time sleek and as slim as possible while finishing this achievement. Not only is this one pretty simple to complete but it’s really the best time to do it so that you can say that you’ve seen what these instances used to look like before the big Cataclysm ripped them a new one (literally).

6) Outland Dungeon/ Heroics: If you have a lvl 80 toon of any class, I’m pretty sure that you could Solo Outland Heroics. I’ve been doing this with my Protection Paladin and I haven’t run into any major problems. Now, this is not to say that I haven’t gotten myself killed a few times... because I have. I’m pretty sure that every class will feel differently about these heroics. DPS could burn down a single target pretty damn quickly and may struggle with pulling large packs of mobs. Whereas, Tanks have a problem with burning things down fast enough but could tank large groups of mobs for days without much fuss. Healers, on the other hand, I have no clue about you. You may just want to switch to an off-spec to achieve this. I mean if you’re a Priest & have Holy & Disc as your two chosen specs, then Smite away you mighty Smiters! Let me know how that turns out. I’ve also noticed that I had to deal with some of the gimmicks that a DPS didn’t even know existed such as kiting Bosses, or interrupts just to name a few. I’m also going to attach a warning to this if you are indeed soloing these on a Heroic level: Since you are a lvl 80 & have such a small aggro box, you will tend to skip pulls and head straight to a Boss without much thought. The Major problem with this is that some of these Bosses, when engaging them, tend to pull the entire room that you skipped. Please be aware of this before engaging a boss. This could lead to a wipe & body run of embarrassment. It’s almost humorous when you engage a boss & you see a sea of red mobs running straight to you. Just an FYI :)

5) Outlands Reputation: Again, depending on when you entered the game, you may or may not have a large task at hand with this one. Similar to Northrend, heroics offer you reputation by simply killing mobs. Please note: You do not need a Faction Tabard to grind specific reputation. In Outlands, you have to run a specific dungeon to get specific rep for each faction. For example: Cent. Expedition, you will need to run Coilfang Instances that are located at the bottom of the lake in Zangermarsh. If you are super lazy and just want to run random heroics, go for it & just note what reputation you are receiving from each one. I’m pretty sure that if you want to get your Outland Dungeon/ Heroics Achievements finished first, you’ll have a nice chunk of Rep. already completed. For the factions that are not represented in a dungeon, this will require completing dailies and/or Repeatable turn in quests. Some of these repeatable quest items can be found on the AH and I suggest looking there if you want to become exalted quickly rather than inexpensively. I would also suggest looking into some of the neat little things you can buy with Faction Reputation. Non-combat pets, tabards (that you’ll actually want to wear), & mounts (Riding & Flying) are definitely some of the best rewards that you can get. Have fun!

4) Attunements & Keys: This may or may not seem pointless because a lot of these attunements or keys aren’t needed anymore. But what else are you gunna do with your time?! In Wrath of the Lich king, there weren’t any attunements or keys factored in because they weren’t “fun” for the player. But here’s the thing, these story lines of how the instance was locked away or how the bad guy inside came to be is lost without these quests chains. What really got me on the kick to work on these attunements/ gather keys was the Karazan Raid. To this day, you still need a key to get inside. The Karazan key/ urn of Nightbane quests will take you all over the place in Outlands & into a lot of dungeons that you’ll need keys for as well. This one could be a doozey if you let it.

3) Non-combat Pet/ Mount Collecting: Some of these are extremely easy to get/ purchase from a vendor or a quest chain. While others, are downright luck based drops or Reputation grinds. If you really like vanity stuff, this could seem endless (hence why it’s number 3 on my list). With the reputation grinds that you are accomplishing, you’ll definitely be gathering up some of these cuties right & left. The biggest Challenge that I present to you will be the luck based drops. Examples for vanity pets are the little Whelps that could drop from your first mob or your one millionth. These little guys are so adorable & they squeak when you poke them. If you are a dragon lover such as myself, you’ve gotta catch em all. Plus, I have a horrible feeling that since these old world zones are being torn asunder, these pets might not be available much longer. Same with some Mounts, as zones & instances are being reworked, who knows if these little goodies will still be around. Good Luck!

2) Loremaster/ Seeker Achievements: Yeah, you knew that I would go here. If you are the ultimate completionist, this should be on the top of your list of things to do. This is actually quite nice to accomplish if you do it in chunks. Working by zone or Continent really makes this task look a lot more digestible. If you are serious about completing this one, I would suggest downloading an addon from Curse.com called “EveryQuest” It lets you view all of the quests that you have previously completed and ones that you still need to complete that count towards your Loremaster title. If you do complete these achievements, you’ll receive the Dungeon ones too.

Drum Roll Please…..

1) Insane in the Membrane Feat of Strength: Can I say one thing here: HOT DAMN! If you really want everyone to know how bored you are right now, tackle this Achievement and you, my friend, are a badass of the ultimate kind. If someone called you a “No-Lifer” before, those fools will grovel at your feet and call you their King. Not only would you become Exalted with some of the most obscure Factions in the game, but you would probably have to dig down deep and have to become hated with Goblins & then make them love you again without pissing of Pirates (yeah that sounds pretty insane by itself). There have been so many strats on how to achieve this written that I’m not going to even bother. I must say though, I highly suggest making a plan before you attempt. Make sure that you know what’s involved and what’s at stake here. Not only will these be extremely time consuming but extremely expensive if you let it. In the end, you will have the coolest (subjective) & hardest to achieve title in the game. This title is so rare that I’ve actually never seen it in game.

So there you have it folks. This list, if completed will probably take you well into Cataclysm. If you’re sitting there complaining that you have nothing to do…. PACK OF LIES! If you are that one guy who has achieved every single Achievement in-game, then fine, you win. But the rest of you 10.9 Million slackers better start crackin’ because boredom doesn’t go away by itself ;)

<3 Fuu

The Legend of the Pit Pwners

We were but five adventurers. Already, one dungeon had fallen to our onslaught: Gundrak. Of course, that dungeon was approached in a more traditional manner.  You see, sometimes, when things aren't well planned out by the leader (coughmecough), you may find yourself later in a bit of a bind.

We were but five adventurers: One with a Pally and a Priest.  One a Hunter, one a Warlock.  Another Pally.  And me, a Death Knight or Warlock.  Between us, we had but one healing spec.  Gundrak witnessed the Priest, the Pally, two Locks, and a Hunter.  Traditional, like I said, and we rolled the place.  In fact, between the Priest and I, we made it somewhat of a game to see if we "accidentally" pull and get our tank friend to pull off of us before our bubbles ran out.  I'm sure he appreciated it.

We were but five adventurers, all from the same guild.  This is important, because not only are these people I know, but also they're people that know me enough to trust in my judgment.  We weren't randomly throwing things together, these were coordinated attacks.  Or so we thought.  Then, having completed the first random dungeon, desire was expressed for a second run so those of us with two toons could get the daily done on both.  The Priest (Fuu) switched to her Pally, and I my Death Knight. 

We were but five adventurers, four DPS and one tank.  No healers.  No healing off-specs.  No healing gear.  No healing experience (on the toons we'd brought).  We could have asked Fuu to suck it up and heal again.  We could have just dropped one and picked up a friend with a heal spec.  We could have gone about it the traditional way.  But nay, said I.  We can do this.  We don't need no stinking heals!  We were two Paladins, a Death Knight, a Hunter, and a Warlock.

We were but five adventurers who drew Pit of Sauron, randomly.  The second toughest dungeon currently possible.  A wave of fear swept through our able bodies.  Yet, persevere we would, it was decided.  Give in to convention we would not.  We were going to do this sans heals.  This wasn't about foolish pride or a scientific experiment.  This was about the thrill of the challenge.  The Azerothian gods had hurled at us a herculean task, who were we to toss it back, unaccepted?  Unrewarded?  

We were but five adventurers, but we had a plan: everyone take care of themselves.  With one Paladin tanking, the other could help throw an occasional heal to supplement her own healing.  The Warlock could Drain Life.  The Death Knight could Death Strike.  The Hunter could... do whatever it is that Hunters do.  We would survive.  We had all our lives to live, and all our love to give.  We would survive.  Yeah, yeah. 

We were but five adventurers as we made our first pull.  The skeletal monstrosity limped towards us, and with a shower of sparks from metal meeting shield, we were off.  Almost immediately, a patrol ambushed us from behind while another skeletal monstrosity lumbered magically up a cliff to join the fray.  We were swiftly and soundly defeated.  Yet Azeroth is not without its second chances.  We would not be deterred by troubled beginnings.  Many an epic hero hath started out from such humble roots.  "Let's not do that again," decried the Ret Pally upon our collective revival.

We were but five adventurers, tempered by an unfortunate fall.  We pulled again.  This time, success.  We made another pull, and another, and another.  Waves of enemies fell before our blades as sweat began to bead on our brows.  It was not easy, it was not hard.  It was.  We pulled some old tricks out of our dusty spellbooks, Laying Hands on this and Frost Trapping that, and when we looked up, we had reached our first boss.  He was bigger than big, and when engaged him, he smote the party with mighty party-wide damages.  Yet when the dust cleared, he was face down and four of us were alive. 

We were but five adventurers, now saved to this instance.  In much the same manner we defeated the construct with the Gnome on its poisonous shoulders.  Avoiding damage became as important as dealing it, and we excelled at both.  Jaina came down to congratulate us after that second boss fell, and once again four of us stood at the end.  We regrouped and prepared for some of the toughest pulls in the dungeon.  We used Paladin Repentance and Hunter Traps and Death Knight Silences to attack these challenging groups of enemies.  For each pull we made, we lost at least one of our own, but we never were defeated.  The sweat was now running in rivulets down our faces, but our fingers were dry and our mind's eyes sharp.

We were but five adventurers as we faced the gauntlet.  There was no swift grouping of many mobs in the middle, there was only a slow, steady slogging that led inexorably towards the exit.  Once, upon reaching the middle platform, a quick rez was thrown, but otherwise we were untouchable.  We dodged the falling ice even as we exited the hellacious tunnel, finishing off the last of the rabble before Tyranus belittled our own companions.  By now, the Light of the conclusion of the dungeon had begun to brighten our glistening faces.  The end was near, we need only beware of the Overlord's Mark.

We were but five adventurers, all five alive, when the final boss fell.  The scant reward of emblems and gold did not seem to do justice to the struggle we'd just overcome, yet cheers could be heard over vent.  Our smiles, laughter, and suspended disbelief were their own rewards, and they were plentiful.  We had done what we thought impossible.  Were we the heroes to end all heroes?  No.  But for that one moment, we might as well have been. 

There were not achievements or announcements to mark the occasion.  The gorge did not suddenly close it's gates and Jaina did not give me so much as a kiss.  Fanfare did not herald our arrival back in Dalaran.  In fact, business went on pretty much as usual.  I believe one guildy said "nice".  That was all there was.  We did not get a title or even a usable piece of gear.  Yet, for the five of us, something special happened last night.  We, the Pwners of the Pit, did what was thought "not even remotely imaginable".

The moral of this story is not that we were overgeared, overskilled, or overly lucky.  The lesson is not that healers are unnecessary.  The goal is not to e-peen.  What you should take from this epic tale of five adventurers is that, in this World of Warcraft, the challenges are only what we make of them.  Your most treasured achievements may not result in special points or hard currency.  No, the best times are the times we spend with friends, throwing convention somewhat to the wind, and leveling mountains with our digital prowess.  And isn't that what makes this game of ours truly epic?

As the sun sets on our tale today, I hear a voice cry out from the wilderness: "Screenshot or it didn't happen." 

The Pwners of the Pit