This week, after some excellent progress in our first night in Ulduar (eight bosses down), we were in a good position to finally see the last two bosses of the instance. We only had Freya left to quickly down on Sunday night, then we were on to General Vezax.
Who went down in three tries. First attempt got him to 34%. Second attempt wasn't quite as good - a cast wasn't interrupted which took out the healer on me, and I died shortly after. At this point, our Paladin healer had realised he could solo heal me without any mana issues, so we downed General Vezax on the third try with one tank, two healers and seven DPS (four of which were melee).
We went on to Yogg-Saron, which was a disaster. We wiped twice in about ten minutes because people couldn't handle not standing in the clouds (what the fuck? It's not difficult to avoid them), then people said we should call it because people were getting unfocused. I have a different word for it, but whatever. We still had two days before the reset, which meant Yogg-Saron was (in my mind) going down this week.
Last night we went back to Ulduar, and had some more attempts on Yogg-Saron. Phase one generally went smoothly, with only the very occasional additional add spawn (which we could handle). The first few attempts on the second phase were ugly, with the group ending up spread out, DPS not knowing what they should be targetting, and people running in the opposite direction when they got brain linked.
We finally made some progress, getting Yogg-Saron to 49% before wiping. I was confident that, with a few more attempts, we could reach phase three. The next attempt was awful, with the melee DPS only getting 300k damage done on the brain in 12 minutes of the 15 minute enrage timer. Healer had to leave, we called it less than two hours after the first pull of the evening.
This is where I got annoyed. People having to go and calling a raid due to a lack of replacements I can understand. However, people seem generally unwilling to dedicate any more time to working on Yogg-Saron this week, which I don't understand and find frustrating. Apparently spending two nights wiping on a boss is enough. What the hell? We've spent less than one full night's worth of raiding wiping on the boss, it was just spread out across two evenings.
The raid content is only going to get harder - if they're unwilling to dedicate more than a few hours a week to learning difficult content, we're going to make incredibly slow progress and there's no point in me being here.
I can sort of understand wanting to do ToC for the emblems and loot, but they've already downed the Northrend Beasts this week, and Lord Jaraxxus won't (shouldn't) take an entire raid session to kill. Two attempts at most, otherwise something is wrong. Will we then go back to Ulduar and spend more time on Yogg-Saron, or just do nothing?
Tuesday, 25 August 2009
Trial of the Crusader
I've downed the first two bosses from the new 10 man normal raid, Trial of the Crusader. The Northrend Beasts and Lord Jaraxxus, and neither seemed like a particularly difficult fight. We wiped some on both bosses before downing them, but that's to be expected when learning new content.
The only hard part of the Northrend Beasts is the start of the second phase, where both of the Jormungar are alive. There seemed to be some confusion as to how exactly the debuffs worked, especially as different people are affected depending on whether or not they're static or mobile. After a few attempts we managed to sort these issues, and downed the boss (the third phase is awesome amounts of fun, by the way).
We downed Lord Jaraxxus in four tries. The first attempt we had no idea what to expect - for some reason people decided to start the fight without taking a break to look up anything about the fight - and wiped fast. The second attempt went better. The third attempt should have had the boss down; we had one person up when the boss was on about 10-15k health - a Paladin tank (not me). He died when the boss was on 1k. The next attempt Jaraxxus went down, and I bought myself a new Libram (the +200 strength one).
The only hard part of the Northrend Beasts is the start of the second phase, where both of the Jormungar are alive. There seemed to be some confusion as to how exactly the debuffs worked, especially as different people are affected depending on whether or not they're static or mobile. After a few attempts we managed to sort these issues, and downed the boss (the third phase is awesome amounts of fun, by the way).
We downed Lord Jaraxxus in four tries. The first attempt we had no idea what to expect - for some reason people decided to start the fight without taking a break to look up anything about the fight - and wiped fast. The second attempt went better. The third attempt should have had the boss down; we had one person up when the boss was on about 10-15k health - a Paladin tank (not me). He died when the boss was on 1k. The next attempt Jaraxxus went down, and I bought myself a new Libram (the +200 strength one).
Downfall of the Spellweaver
Malygos went down about a week ago. Finally. It's been the only kill I've needed for the Champion of the Frozen Wastes achievement for quite a few months but I've never been particularly proactive in searching for groups to attempt it. I'd had one or two failed attempts, then the group would fall apart; typical pug mentality.
We put a group together from the guild, pugged a few DPS, and gave it a try. We wiped on the first phase due to a lack of healing, and decided to grab a third healer when one of the DPS quit a few tries later. With three healers we got to the third phase, but didn't manage to down him before the enrage.
A few tries later, I'd finally discovered the secret to DPSing on the drakes. I had always been aware that the rotation was 1... 1... 2 but had never managed to find a speed that didn't leave me out of energy pretty quickly. The secret, I found, was to wait for your Engulf in Flames debuff to tick down to ~5 seconds, then do the rotation again - no energy problems, and eventually a stack that was doing 24k damage a tick (before I died).
I still haven't figured out a way to stay alive on phase three yet (I never seem to get any healing?), but that's ok. I have the achievement and probably won't be doing Malygos again.
We put a group together from the guild, pugged a few DPS, and gave it a try. We wiped on the first phase due to a lack of healing, and decided to grab a third healer when one of the DPS quit a few tries later. With three healers we got to the third phase, but didn't manage to down him before the enrage.
A few tries later, I'd finally discovered the secret to DPSing on the drakes. I had always been aware that the rotation was 1... 1... 2 but had never managed to find a speed that didn't leave me out of energy pretty quickly. The secret, I found, was to wait for your Engulf in Flames debuff to tick down to ~5 seconds, then do the rotation again - no energy problems, and eventually a stack that was doing 24k damage a tick (before I died).
I still haven't figured out a way to stay alive on phase three yet (I never seem to get any healing?), but that's ok. I have the achievement and probably won't be doing Malygos again.
Updates upon updates
I just realised I haven't updated for close to three weeks. I've been busy with raiding and other things, and haven't thought about posting about all the stuff I've been doing. I'll be putting up some posts about some of the things I've been doing, as well as going back and finally adding tags (Blogger calls them labels) to my old posts.
Thursday, 6 August 2009
More First Impressions of 3.2
The Paladin changes are overall pretty fantastic.
The change to Exorcism has taken away one ranged pick up ability, and some of the damage/threat output, but from the instances I've tanked so far - several heroics and Naxx 10 - it won't be a big issue. I'm surprised at how quickly I've gotten out of the habit of hitting the key for Exorcism (I replaced it on my action bar with Sacred Shield) when trying to grab adds.
The change to Blessing of Sanctuary is fantastic, but also bugged. No longer having to choose between the additional health of Kings and the mana return/damage reduction of Sanctuary is great in 5 or 10 man groups where I'm the only Paladin.
Between the changes to Shield of Righteousness and Seal of Vengeance, I think Prot Paladin single target DPS is about the same as it was before - possibly a bit higher, I haven't really looked at numbers. I'll have to look at the damage I get tanking Emalon adds to have more of an idea how much difference it has made.
The removal of the duration on Righteous Fury is fantastic, though I noticed that the mana cost hasn't been removed. I was hoping for a 0 mana, toggleable ability similar to auras. Righteous Fury contributes a large chunk of my buffing mana consumption, which becomes a serious problem when being combat ressed during boss encounters (I have just over 5.5k mana, buffing costs me a large percentage of that).
The Ardent Defender change is fantastic. It saved my ass on the Kel'Thuzad fight when we were finishing off Naxx 10 (I swear I was out of that void zone), and seems like it will help a lot on fights like Mimiron and General Vezax where there's the potential to take a large amount of damage quickly that healers may not be prepared for.
The only new content I've seen so far is the 5 man, Trial of the Champion. I ran it on both heroic and normal (losing a roll on the new tank trinket), and was overall very disappointed with it.
Having to use mounts and joust for the first boss(es) is a neat idea, except that I HATE the jousting on WoW with a passion. It seems clumsy and awkward, but that might just be because I'm no good at it, I don't know.
After that it was just general tank and spank trash, no seemingly great challenge. We wiped once on the first boss (on the jousting part), but after that we only had a couple of deaths from people pulling additional groups before the second boss fight. Maybe I'm just too used to Ulduar at this point, though.
I might see if I can DPS some heroics later today to see what the changes are like from the Retribution point of view, then possibly try out the new battleground. Holy Paladins are, from what I saw in Naxx last night, now insane. I think the Paladin we had (who isn't even geared well enough for Ulduar) could have solo healed a large amount of it.
The change to Exorcism has taken away one ranged pick up ability, and some of the damage/threat output, but from the instances I've tanked so far - several heroics and Naxx 10 - it won't be a big issue. I'm surprised at how quickly I've gotten out of the habit of hitting the key for Exorcism (I replaced it on my action bar with Sacred Shield) when trying to grab adds.
The change to Blessing of Sanctuary is fantastic, but also bugged. No longer having to choose between the additional health of Kings and the mana return/damage reduction of Sanctuary is great in 5 or 10 man groups where I'm the only Paladin.
Between the changes to Shield of Righteousness and Seal of Vengeance, I think Prot Paladin single target DPS is about the same as it was before - possibly a bit higher, I haven't really looked at numbers. I'll have to look at the damage I get tanking Emalon adds to have more of an idea how much difference it has made.
The removal of the duration on Righteous Fury is fantastic, though I noticed that the mana cost hasn't been removed. I was hoping for a 0 mana, toggleable ability similar to auras. Righteous Fury contributes a large chunk of my buffing mana consumption, which becomes a serious problem when being combat ressed during boss encounters (I have just over 5.5k mana, buffing costs me a large percentage of that).
The Ardent Defender change is fantastic. It saved my ass on the Kel'Thuzad fight when we were finishing off Naxx 10 (I swear I was out of that void zone), and seems like it will help a lot on fights like Mimiron and General Vezax where there's the potential to take a large amount of damage quickly that healers may not be prepared for.
The only new content I've seen so far is the 5 man, Trial of the Champion. I ran it on both heroic and normal (losing a roll on the new tank trinket), and was overall very disappointed with it.
Having to use mounts and joust for the first boss(es) is a neat idea, except that I HATE the jousting on WoW with a passion. It seems clumsy and awkward, but that might just be because I'm no good at it, I don't know.
After that it was just general tank and spank trash, no seemingly great challenge. We wiped once on the first boss (on the jousting part), but after that we only had a couple of deaths from people pulling additional groups before the second boss fight. Maybe I'm just too used to Ulduar at this point, though.
I might see if I can DPS some heroics later today to see what the changes are like from the Retribution point of view, then possibly try out the new battleground. Holy Paladins are, from what I saw in Naxx last night, now insane. I think the Paladin we had (who isn't even geared well enough for Ulduar) could have solo healed a large amount of it.
Wednesday, 5 August 2009
First Impressions of 3.2
Because everyone else is doing it.
It took me ~35 minutes to download the patch, only to have problems with installation because "WoW.exe couldn't be found." I had the bright idea of moving the downloader file for the patch over to my World of Warcraft folder (where the WoW.exe file is located - makes sense, right?) and running it - only to find I had to download the patch again. ~60% later I finally remembered I'd already downloaded the patch into another folder, cancelled the download and copied the files over. Same error.
The fix? Right-click, "Run as Administrator" on WoW.exe then run the patch install again. Fuck you, Vista.
The patch is now installed and I've spent half an hour trying to log into a server that went up nearly an hour late (thanks Blizzard). I'm getting as far as "Retrieving character list" before finally being disconnected.
At this point I haven't even seen 3.2 in action and I hate it already. Will update when I can actually login.
It took me ~35 minutes to download the patch, only to have problems with installation because "WoW.exe couldn't be found." I had the bright idea of moving the downloader file for the patch over to my World of Warcraft folder (where the WoW.exe file is located - makes sense, right?) and running it - only to find I had to download the patch again. ~60% later I finally remembered I'd already downloaded the patch into another folder, cancelled the download and copied the files over. Same error.
The fix? Right-click, "Run as Administrator" on WoW.exe then run the patch install again. Fuck you, Vista.
The patch is now installed and I've spent half an hour trying to log into a server that went up nearly an hour late (thanks Blizzard). I'm getting as far as "Retrieving character list" before finally being disconnected.
At this point I haven't even seen 3.2 in action and I hate it already. Will update when I can actually login.
Tuesday, 28 July 2009
Maybe I expect too much
I've been growing increasingly annoyed with the raid groups I've been in recently. Pugs are - in general, and as expected - frustrating. But even what has become my frequent 10 man group has begun to bother me. All highly capable players, but seemingly unable to follow simple instructions in a manner that I find acceptable. I've always been a bit of a perfectionist, I realise that. However, I don't think that the expectations I have of them are overly high.
If I tell them to stack on me (or anybody else), I expect their character to be indistinguishable from that person - not stood within 5-10 yards of them.
If I tell them to stand somewhere, I expect them not only to stand there but to continue to stand there unless they're told they can move, they ABSOLUTELY HAVE to move, or are moved by an enemy.
I expect ranged to actually STAY at range. If they can attack from 30-40 yards away, I expect them to be close to 30 or 40 yards from an enemy unless they're told otherwise.
I expect EVERYBODY (with the possible exception of the other tank) to stay behind me. Not stood with me and certainly not stood in front of me, unless I tell them otherwise.
I know what I want, and I expect to get it. I'm not asking them to be the greatest players in the world ever, just to do simple things in a professional manner.
So, you tell me. Am I asking for too much or is my annoyance justified?
If I tell them to stack on me (or anybody else), I expect their character to be indistinguishable from that person - not stood within 5-10 yards of them.
If I tell them to stand somewhere, I expect them not only to stand there but to continue to stand there unless they're told they can move, they ABSOLUTELY HAVE to move, or are moved by an enemy.
I expect ranged to actually STAY at range. If they can attack from 30-40 yards away, I expect them to be close to 30 or 40 yards from an enemy unless they're told otherwise.
I expect EVERYBODY (with the possible exception of the other tank) to stay behind me. Not stood with me and certainly not stood in front of me, unless I tell them otherwise.
I know what I want, and I expect to get it. I'm not asking them to be the greatest players in the world ever, just to do simple things in a professional manner.
So, you tell me. Am I asking for too much or is my annoyance justified?
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