A quick screenie of my first Amber-Shaper Un’sok kill. I hate that fight, not because it is complex with many phases and jobs, but because the end is a zerg where discretion and strategy seem to go out the window. So much planning just to go Zeeeeeeeeerg.
I don’t know how many shots we had, but Sha of Fear on normal is very unforgiving. Look at all the skeletons! I’m looking forward to killing him, and will have to keep working on my tank gear for this.
I queued for LFR as dps hoping to get a sub-40 minute wait. Wish granted – but the group was staring at the Sha of Fear, and we were one tank down. Damn it, I hate waiting.
So I grabbed my Tank set, chatted to the current heavy, and we pulled. One Dead Sha. And I think my meter is broken in that fight, as it has my 8th on Dps – which cannot be true.
I think I’ll do more tanking in LFR now.
I think he still had some faffing to do. But he did come back online quickly. 
Our Wednesday raiders typically smash Mogu’shan Vaults in a reliable and solid way. Much of the gear now goes to offsets or to DE and frustratingly a few of the team still await those few gear drops that will snugly fit them out. Last night I joined them for the MV clear, but due to the silly season we were a few characters/roles short. That meant some characters needed to switch roles around, which adds risk and can frustrate.
To facilitate the first 3x boss kills before one of our regular tanks could join us – I became the off-Tank for the first three fights. I was bloody nervous being Blood spec. Now that I can look back some cool things happened:
(a) It was challenging and fun. Fun because I saw these fights in a totally new light, and didn’t feel that I made more than a few silly mistakes which cost us. I love seeing new content, and changing roles really does change the fights significantly.
I loved the Petrify mechanic in the Three Puppies Fight and think it is a very clever idea. I hate it as a Melee dps as the mobs move around, but I love it as a Tank as the fight becomes about correct taunting, positioning the bosses, awareness of bad on the floor, and control of cool-downs. It is better as Tank than melee dps.
Trash in MV is “be aware” and “use common sense” rather than disastrously punishing and that makes sense. Yes, some hit hard/often (especially if you’re missing significant amounts of requisite Tank stats because you’re using high level Dps gear) but use of cool-downs and not being an ass made this viable.
I didn’t understand the tricky-button-thing for Feng and likely didn’t use it properly ever. It smells like a gimmick to me, or rather a good idea executed using a gimmick button, anyway I need to see and do that fight more to learn what/how.
The poncy dress wearing Troll Shaman Boss was cool, switching based upon being pulled into the Spirit realm means we have a reason to be there – and the task of smashing the special Tank mob is plain enough to be straight forward. Much more than that it seemed I was just hitting and swinging. I’m OK with that.
(b) While actually Tanking nothing really awesome dropped, but some Tank gear did drop when I was back in Dps mode, which I snaffled for my Tank set (a great 489 Ring, and a dps Helm I can re-purpose for Tanking). Offspec gearing looks to be a higher need if I Tank again, so I’ll amp up the priority.
(c) I’d like to see the later 3 bosses in Tank mode too. Elegon’s taunt-switch sounds like something I think I’ve done before and having the positioning and stacking buffs keeps us honest.
I have no idea how to execute the Emperor’s New Dance mechanic for the Will of the Emperor fight, but will be willing to learn (link)
ps. We did have a few funny screw-ups along the way, but I have not yet made character assassination demands from the Priest involved yet; just waiting while I ponder how much gold those screenshots are worth to stay hidden. Your secret is safe Sir, for now.
Happy Killing
I had the pleasure of smashing Garalon last night in Heart of Fear, playing 10 man Normal mode with the guild. Here is the kill screenie I took with the other Insidious folks.
The wonderful thing about last night was the fact that we stayed at it, and it was one of the classic kills.
We all survived to kill him, and then all died just after the boss (he enraged, but we killed him in 7:05m), we kept at it beyond the official end time of the raid (which caused much aggro and enraging offline), and many folks were tempted to change strat after each attempt (which evoked in me the “shut up and pull” twitch).
Our top DPS did 105k dps (this particular Warrior is a dps bamix, just insert squishies), with the next three characters doing 90k or higher as well; with all dps having 97-98% up time on the boss. For a fight where you switch targets that is pretty healthy!
On a DK note – my self healing abilities did about 2% healing (or approx 1,526,635 health) which shows just how important self healing abilities are in that fight. On the early attempts I was not self healing as much, as it is a Dps loss to use some of the more efficient heals, but in combination with damage resistance cool-downs (Icebound Fort, you’re a wonderful toy) I think the extra effort really helps keep everyone alive. The less healing I need the more healing that somebody else takes.
The counter to that was the 7.1 million Health healing that I needed over the fight, which was about average across the team (massive crush in the logs fusks the ratios, so has to be ignored)
For Raid Progression it makes us MV 6/6, and 3/6 in HoF – and 20th on the server (although 18th if you go 10 man strict – how ever the bloody hell logic). Apparently the next boss is far easier, or so the raid lead promises.
When he’s not dead due to how awesome our raiders are the big fat bug looks like something out of a sci-fi film.
Happy Killing
Ps. The comment about changing stats wasn’t a snarky shot at anyone in the team, it’s my own OCD.
A “note to self” on what item levels are needed to get into the MoP Scenarios, Dungeons, and Raids, and what item level they drop. Also what is obtainable from Factions and Craftables, via gold and Reputation.
Why? Because I frequently get them confused with each other…
Scenarios
Heroic 5-mans
Mogushan Vaults (raid)
Heart of Fear and Terrace of Endless Spring (raids)
Reputation Rewards
Craftables
Happy killing
Huge news – and perhaps in response to the community being pissed off about the low rate of valor collection – the rewards will be boosted in maintenance today – from 25 to 40 VPs per kill. Wow Insider has the skinny, twitter post from GhostCrawler, and patch notes.
Normal and Heroic raid encounters in Mogu’shan Vaults, Heart of Fear, and Terrace of Endless Spring now award 40 Valor, up from 25. This will take effect after the weekly reset.
Wow. Excellent!
What does it mean? Well for a start raiders have a reason to spin through a clear of Mogu’shun Vaults for Valor instead of doing dailies. 240 VP per clear is far better than 150.
Also in this patch is the Spirit Kings appearing in a set order – interesting. Was it enough of an issue that folks found it hard? A particular order did not seem to be more difficult. No more than the selection of Doggies in the 3 Dogs fight being sometimes a pain.
Happy Killing. Continue reading
I’m DHBU at the moment covering for one of my PMs who is on two weeks leave, and my wife started working again this week, and all sorts of real life junk…which gets in the way of a good gaming session.
In Warcraft the absolute highlight of the month so far was last night getting a new sword upgrade (finally) from Elegon, which replaced my crappy item level 463 weapon - Starshatter. It’s a great looking toy. It might get transmogged to an older style Death Knight weapon soon, as they look even better.
Screenshots and happy rants will follow soon, for now though – I’m a happy lad.
I cannot help but love an almost 1200 raw dps upgrade, plus the additional stats.
Happy Killing.
Saw the wowinsider post about dps performance in raids, 10 man through LFR to 25 man Heroic. The disparity (based upon raidbot) between Unholy vs Frost Death Knights is wider than I thought, especially when you show the data given an average, and the Unholy is below average; approx 10-20% difference based upon ideal scenarios, depending on what style of raid you are playing in. Bugger.
Nobody likes being below average. I’ll have to rectify my spec choice asap. 10% might translate doing ~12.5% of the dps in a fight into ~13%, which could also be considered a slightly faster transition between boss phases in most fights. That is a key factor in killing bosses successfully!
What is disparaging is that some classes-specs are not suffering a 10% gap, they’re in the 22-35% below average range! Some BM Hunter, Frost mages, and one Rogue spec are horrid, and Monks are not far behind them. By comparison a DK being 10% shy of average is doing OK. Now in contrast Rogues and Mages have a spec each that can do well, so all is not lost. Afflic Warlocks, Fire Mages and Shadow Priests should be lighting up the dps charts.
What should this type of information lead to?
Perhaps it should create awareness of the potential to improve by switching play styles amongst characters, and it should certainly serve as some guide for who to take to a raid. Taking a Mage who is not spec’ed into Fire is not doing the raid any favours (that is not to say don’t bring the player, et al – just be aware).
It should not be taken as an excuse to whine about balance and favoritism, there is enough of that already. As always theory crafting, especially via graphs should always be taken with a grain of salt. Happy killing.
