Yesterday was my first night playing WoW and my first night raiding in more than two weeks. Can I say painful? Too much Star Wars, perhaps, but at the same time not-raiding makes me rusty.
1. I took off my weapon and shield to take pictures of my latest transmog (two posts down). Well, I kinda forgot to put them back on before the raid. After the first couple of bosses, one of my healers whispered me and asked if that was a glitch or if I really didn't have a weapon and shield?
2. I searched through my inventory and put on the gear that looked right. Except, I put on the gear-to-transmog instead of the transmogged gear. Two fights later, said healer whispers me, are you sure you're wearing the right gear yet?
No, I'm not sure of anything!
3. The Sorcerer speed boost in SW beats the pants off of the paladin speed boost. I kept popping Divine Protection and was disappointed at how far I didn't go.
4. With my shiny new graphics card, WoW looks much better and my FPS is even higher. Perhaps SW will get that sorted out, but right now, WoW wins in the performance-on-average-computers contest. Hands down.
5. I keep telling myself I'm going to stop talking about SW on my WoW blog but the amount of Star Wars chatter in mumble is kinda scary. On one hand, it's fun because I know what's up. On the other, we've never derailed mumble like that for any other game. Again, I don't think this is here nor there for the future of WoW. But I do think this is a bad sign for bigger guilds. And it can't be good for those who don't care about Star Wars, to hear nearly half the guild making jokes that exclude them.
6. I was pretty bad overall. It's like I forgot how to heal. I let judgments fall off and I don't think I hit a special cooldown all night long. Wait. I did use Divine Plea because I was so bad at managing my mana that I was going OOM when I really shouldn't.
7. Ultraxion continues to be the bane of my guild. Even with going to 5 healers we didn't have the DPS last night to down him. It makes me want to rage.
8. Saddith for President.
Showing posts with label fail dps. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fail dps. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
I wish I were something else
Class envy happens quite a bit.
I'm actually quite happy to be a paladin right now. And yes, I am sober. Though I do wish we had a couple more AoE healing options (or rather, that Holy Radiance was a choice instead of a fire-and-forget, perhaps?), we're in a good place. I still miss having a raid-wide bubble (Divine Guardian), and I sure as hell miss Divine Intervention.
It makes me wonder, though, if I had less experience on my other characters if I would feel the same way.
Because I feel like I field a whole lot of "I'm not this" complaints lately. A druid vows that he's rolling a paladin because he's tired of tank healing with hots (tank-healing assignments are by player, not by class, my usual tank healers are AFK to RL lately). A shaman complains that he doesn't have group heals if people aren't stacked up (hello, ALL healing classes suffer from this). If only I had this spell. If only this spell did this effect instead of this. If only my iconic signature healing spell was actually as good as everyone says it is.
I know the truth: it's all close enough. Vixsin has a great write-up for the bench and the top 1% guilds and class balance therein, but I think it's safe to say that for the rest of the world, class balance is "close enough."
When I hear class complaints (from regular mode players), I always get the sense that it's the grass being greener on the other side than any real technical problems. And I'm biased, I know, having experience with all four healers makes me feel pretty confident I could be an asset to my raid no matter which I brought. (Isn't Enlynn so arrogant?!)
I think it's that time of the expansion, though. We hit brick walls on bosses, a key player we got used to having steps out for real-life issues and the void hurts. But instead of saying we miss the person, we say we miss his class mechanics. Sorry, I'm not buying. We miss the player who know to pop a cooldown at the right time. Him being a paladin, a shaman, a priest, not so much the issue. (Though the one night we raided with no priests was a bit weird. Fast forward two weeks and we have 6. Huh?)
And in retrospect, we made it through the summer only having to cancel a couple of raids. I think a few months ago the tones of a lot of my posts were on the verge of grim. We didn't know if we were filling the next raid, but somehow we pulled through. We've even had a waitlist for the past couple of weeks, and been able to let some players take the night off because they needed it without it being too painful for us. So things are looking up, even though we're still stuck on Beth. We got so close.
I hate fights like Beth'tilac not because of Phase 2 (which I'm doing better on, admittedly) because for Phase 1 I am stuck up on top so I have no sense for what the ground phase looks like. We had some (I hate to place blame here, but I saw some healers pull miracles out of their asses so...) DPS who would rather make excuses for why the adds don't go down than to just make the adds go down. But anyways. We're almost there.
Though, if you aren't paying attention to who has died and who has casted Brez, and you have no idea when the phase change is coming, you perhaps are not the best candidate to demand who brezes who. Just sayin'. Let someone who's actually using raid frames and situational awareness take care of that, hmm? Or maybe a RAID LEADER?
Oh, and our ranks are strictly attendance based, so when you take a demotion it is absolutely, positively, 100% NOT PERSONAL. Making it personal and threatening to quit gets you nowhere.
/rant off
We could still stand to recruit a few more people, but I think that's standard fare in a 25-raid, there's always a bit more room. We're raiding this week, and that's great. And if the worst problems I have to deal with this week are "I wish my class had this", then that's not a bad place to be at all. :)
I'm actually quite happy to be a paladin right now. And yes, I am sober. Though I do wish we had a couple more AoE healing options (or rather, that Holy Radiance was a choice instead of a fire-and-forget, perhaps?), we're in a good place. I still miss having a raid-wide bubble (Divine Guardian), and I sure as hell miss Divine Intervention.
It makes me wonder, though, if I had less experience on my other characters if I would feel the same way.
Because I feel like I field a whole lot of "I'm not this" complaints lately. A druid vows that he's rolling a paladin because he's tired of tank healing with hots (tank-healing assignments are by player, not by class, my usual tank healers are AFK to RL lately). A shaman complains that he doesn't have group heals if people aren't stacked up (hello, ALL healing classes suffer from this). If only I had this spell. If only this spell did this effect instead of this. If only my iconic signature healing spell was actually as good as everyone says it is.
I know the truth: it's all close enough. Vixsin has a great write-up for the bench and the top 1% guilds and class balance therein, but I think it's safe to say that for the rest of the world, class balance is "close enough."
When I hear class complaints (from regular mode players), I always get the sense that it's the grass being greener on the other side than any real technical problems. And I'm biased, I know, having experience with all four healers makes me feel pretty confident I could be an asset to my raid no matter which I brought. (Isn't Enlynn so arrogant?!)
I think it's that time of the expansion, though. We hit brick walls on bosses, a key player we got used to having steps out for real-life issues and the void hurts. But instead of saying we miss the person, we say we miss his class mechanics. Sorry, I'm not buying. We miss the player who know to pop a cooldown at the right time. Him being a paladin, a shaman, a priest, not so much the issue. (Though the one night we raided with no priests was a bit weird. Fast forward two weeks and we have 6. Huh?)
And in retrospect, we made it through the summer only having to cancel a couple of raids. I think a few months ago the tones of a lot of my posts were on the verge of grim. We didn't know if we were filling the next raid, but somehow we pulled through. We've even had a waitlist for the past couple of weeks, and been able to let some players take the night off because they needed it without it being too painful for us. So things are looking up, even though we're still stuck on Beth. We got so close.
I hate fights like Beth'tilac not because of Phase 2 (which I'm doing better on, admittedly) because for Phase 1 I am stuck up on top so I have no sense for what the ground phase looks like. We had some (I hate to place blame here, but I saw some healers pull miracles out of their asses so...) DPS who would rather make excuses for why the adds don't go down than to just make the adds go down. But anyways. We're almost there.
Though, if you aren't paying attention to who has died and who has casted Brez, and you have no idea when the phase change is coming, you perhaps are not the best candidate to demand who brezes who. Just sayin'. Let someone who's actually using raid frames and situational awareness take care of that, hmm? Or maybe a RAID LEADER?
Oh, and our ranks are strictly attendance based, so when you take a demotion it is absolutely, positively, 100% NOT PERSONAL. Making it personal and threatening to quit gets you nowhere.
/rant off
We could still stand to recruit a few more people, but I think that's standard fare in a 25-raid, there's always a bit more room. We're raiding this week, and that's great. And if the worst problems I have to deal with this week are "I wish my class had this", then that's not a bad place to be at all. :)
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
the enrage timer
My guild is working on Cho'gall.
On our last attempt (for we are the masters of the Last Attempt), we lasted long enough to wipe to the enrage timer.
I celebrate the enrage timer like a small victory. We kept everyone up. The tanks did what they needed to do. The healers did what they needed to do.
Now we just get our DPS to switch to adds a tiny bit faster and we get the loot!
The next time you hit an enrage timer, thank your healers.
On our last attempt (for we are the masters of the Last Attempt), we lasted long enough to wipe to the enrage timer.
I celebrate the enrage timer like a small victory. We kept everyone up. The tanks did what they needed to do. The healers did what they needed to do.
Now we just get our DPS to switch to adds a tiny bit faster and we get the loot!
The next time you hit an enrage timer, thank your healers.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Guest Post: Use Your Brrain
Happy Friday! Here's another guest post by Madammayhem!
Wrath of the Lich King brought me from casual player to raider extraordinaire. On the verge of the Cataclysm, these are the most important lessons I can offer.
I can't take all the credit, though. I've learned so much from personal experience, yet so little compared to the knowledge I've garnered from those around me. Take what lessons you can from those who share your World, be they embittered veteran or plucky tyro. Here's a chronological account of what I learned from one prodigious hunter. Lets call him Brrain.
Week Two, 25 ICC:
Brrain: “This is Brrain. I need a heal.”
Healer: “Get out of the slime.”
Brrain: “Who's speaking? Who is that?”
Lesson #1 – Clarity. Be concise and precise. In the example, Brrain introduces himself and declares his need. All pertinent information is realized in his statement. It's important to note that this is Brrain's second week in the guild and his first raid with us.
Week Five, 25 ICC:
Leader: “Everyone switch targets. Everyone, please. I still see some people on the ooze. Hunters...”
Raider: “BRRAIN! GET OFF THE BOSS!”
Brrain: “This is Brrain. Who's talking right now?”
Lesson #2 – Tenacity. Focus on your goal. A single-minded pursuit can only achieve results. Many may try to impede you but if you stay on target, you will certainly prevail.
Week Nine, 25 ICC:
Brrain: “This is Brrain. Does anyone know how to train dogs?”
Tank 1: “Take the boss.”
Tank 2: “Got em.”
Brrain: “Anyone? Rescue...?”
Leader: “Beasts are coming up. Stop aoe.”
Brrain: “Guard dogs...?”
Leader: “Let's focus here people...”
Week Ten, 25, ICC:
Brrain: “Raidleader, this is Brrain. I'm gunna be late. I'm um... I'm bleeding. I got bit...”
Lesson #3 – Know your limits!
Week 14, 25 ICC:
Healer: “I don't know if I'm gunna be able to make it tonight. I feel a migraine coming on.”
Brrain: “If you just take a spoon... or your thumb... and put it in your mouth. There's a spot in your mouth... a pressure point. You can press on it and it... well, it won't make the headache go away, but it'll subside. (pause) This is Brrain.”
Healer: “I just don't think that's going to work.”
Leader: “That's fine, hon. I hope you feel better.”
Lesson #4 – Connect. Wow is a social game, after all. A little understanding goes a long way.
Week 16, 25 ICC:
Brrain: “Raidleader, this is Brrain. I'm missing Arcane Empowerment.”
Leader: “No one gives you Arcane Empowerment. It's an aura. If a person providing the aura is in raid, you get the buff.”
Brrain: “This is Brrain. Everyone else has Arcane Empowerment and I don't. I need someone to give me Arcane Empowerment.”
Leader: “Hmm... so you don't. Well, I don't know why it's happening but it looks like you're getting the same buff from the ret pally. He's talented for it. It's the same buff. It just doesn't show up on your bar. Don't worry—you have it.”
Brrain: “This is Brrain. I still need Arcane Empowerment.”
Week 21, 25 ICC:
Brrain: “Raidleader, this is Brrain. I'm still missing Arcane Empowerment.”
Raider: “Brrain, you have it! EVERYONE HAS IT! You can't not have it!”
Brrain: “This is Brrain. Who was that just speaking?”
Chorus of Raiders: “Brrain, you have the buff.”
Leader: “Brrain, the buff is provi... no... just no. Brrain, I hate to do this but we go over this every week, three nights a week. Please, don't ask again.”
Week 22, 25 ICC:
Brrain: “Raidleader, this is Brrain. I... I uh... (/sigh)... I need Arcane Empowerment.”
Lesson #5 – Caution. Know when to advance slowly. Some situations require finesse.
Week 25, 25 ICC:
Brrain: “This is Brrain. Who just said that?”
Raider: “Nevermind, Brrain. It's a wipe now. You have to stay out of the slime and switch targets when we tell you.”
Brrain: “Raidleader, this is Brrain. How do you turn someone up in vent?”
Leader: “Go to miscellaneous... ”
Brrain: “Raidleader this is Brrain. I can't see the names in vent.”
Leader: “... and then you click volume...”
Raider: “OH MY GOD!”
Brrain: “This is Brrain and I can hear you just fine now.”
Lesson #6 – Be prompt, or don't procrastinate. Remove obstacles to your success as they arise. Handle problems while they're manageable.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
tank healers and vent
There's a school of thought I've run into more than once that healers don't have to be as aware of timers as DPS and tanks because they should be staring at bars. I have to say, perhaps my perspective is unique as I've only really been raiding in 25 man content for less than a year now, and I have since learned how to communicate in vent.
I know, it sounds so simple--just push the button and talk, right?--but there are lots of ways to communicate well and many more ways to communicate poorly. I remember trying to help my man RL 10 man raids, and complaining to him about all the things that people weren't doing, as they weren't doing them, yet I would refuse to just open my vent channel and say "please switch to the kobolds ASAP" or "remember to move the fire away from the raid" or "phase transition, get ready to run". I was, and still am, afraid of being the Bitch.
I'd like to think I've gotten better. It took getting to know the group I played with, and learning that sometimes I really do need to impart information right now. I call out timers. I remind the raid that stuff on the ground is coming up or to get ready for the big fear. I announce my status: I say "Enlynn's valked, big heals on the tank" or "Enlynn's dropping stacks, big heals on the tank" or "Enlynn's silenced, big heals on the tank" (recurring theme here, yes?).
I struggled with calling out my status for a long time. I don't wish to be perceived as self-important, but tank healing and tanking are the most communication-sensitive parts of the game. It's a natural thing to coordinate tank-swaps, adds, debuff management, and anything else that endangers the tanks. It's the first check of the game, keeping the tanks alive to soak the beating. Healers and damage dealers come second.
(I'm not suggesting that tanks and healers and damage dealers are more or less valuable in a group. Tanks are a single point of failure in an encounter, we won't get to the enrage timer if the tanks can't stay alive to see it).
Part of tank healing is not hps or gear or skill, it's reliability. It's not very exciting that our peers are talking about hypothetical damage per second, set bonuses, and pew pew, while I'm maximizing... my reliability factor. How many times have I been incapacitated by an encounter mechanic and thought I didn't need to call it out on vent, only to have the tank go splat because, get this, no one knew to help me heal.
How many wipes could I have prevented if I just pushed the button and said "big heals on the tank"?
There's another huge upside to learning to communicate with the team. My silence means that all is going well. If I want the raid healers to trust me to heal the tank, I really do want to call it out when I can't, otherwise we have three raid healers twitching tank heals because they can't trust me to ask for help when I need it. If they trust me, they can focus on what they need to do, knowing that if I get unchained magic, frost beaconed, or sucked into the sword, I'll ask them to heal the tank.
In a pug, it's even more important. Assuming that the raid leader is paying attention can be a dangerous mistake. I joined a pug LK10 last week, and I unabashedly called out each time I needed help. It covers my ass. If I'm asking for heals on the tank and the tank dies, I did the best I could do and I am not the only one to blame. If I ask for heals on the tank and the tank lives, I've saved us from a wipe. Was it actually necessary? It's hard to say, if they other healers were good they saw it on their raid frames that I was valked or in the dream or in the sword, and were adjusting before I called it out. But again, that's making some pretty serious assumptions.
I'm not an expert on when to call out and when not to. I'm sure that I've called out the most unnecessary things, while keeping my mouth shut when I shouldn't have. Most of the time, it wouldn't wipe the raid if I didn't (or would it?). It's not a chance I want to take. I'll call it out just in case.
I'm sure half the raid thinks "ugh I wish she would just shut up sometimes", but they can deal. I'm not trying to be self-important, I'm trying to give us the best shot we have of boss kills and shiny lootz. Given the choice, I'm sure they'd prefer that I'm calling out my status than calling them out. How many times do you have to be mind controlled before you learn to bite, hmm? (Whoops, the Bitch came out after all!)
What do you call out in your raids? Do you help announce timers, remind players to focus an add, or speak out when you are locked down by a raid mechanic? Do you appreciate it when your tanks and healers are proactive in vent, or does that healadin drive you crazy?
I know, it sounds so simple--just push the button and talk, right?--but there are lots of ways to communicate well and many more ways to communicate poorly. I remember trying to help my man RL 10 man raids, and complaining to him about all the things that people weren't doing, as they weren't doing them, yet I would refuse to just open my vent channel and say "please switch to the kobolds ASAP" or "remember to move the fire away from the raid" or "phase transition, get ready to run". I was, and still am, afraid of being the Bitch.
I'd like to think I've gotten better. It took getting to know the group I played with, and learning that sometimes I really do need to impart information right now. I call out timers. I remind the raid that stuff on the ground is coming up or to get ready for the big fear. I announce my status: I say "Enlynn's valked, big heals on the tank" or "Enlynn's dropping stacks, big heals on the tank" or "Enlynn's silenced, big heals on the tank" (recurring theme here, yes?).
I struggled with calling out my status for a long time. I don't wish to be perceived as self-important, but tank healing and tanking are the most communication-sensitive parts of the game. It's a natural thing to coordinate tank-swaps, adds, debuff management, and anything else that endangers the tanks. It's the first check of the game, keeping the tanks alive to soak the beating. Healers and damage dealers come second.
(I'm not suggesting that tanks and healers and damage dealers are more or less valuable in a group. Tanks are a single point of failure in an encounter, we won't get to the enrage timer if the tanks can't stay alive to see it).
Part of tank healing is not hps or gear or skill, it's reliability. It's not very exciting that our peers are talking about hypothetical damage per second, set bonuses, and pew pew, while I'm maximizing... my reliability factor. How many times have I been incapacitated by an encounter mechanic and thought I didn't need to call it out on vent, only to have the tank go splat because, get this, no one knew to help me heal.
How many wipes could I have prevented if I just pushed the button and said "big heals on the tank"?
There's another huge upside to learning to communicate with the team. My silence means that all is going well. If I want the raid healers to trust me to heal the tank, I really do want to call it out when I can't, otherwise we have three raid healers twitching tank heals because they can't trust me to ask for help when I need it. If they trust me, they can focus on what they need to do, knowing that if I get unchained magic, frost beaconed, or sucked into the sword, I'll ask them to heal the tank.
In a pug, it's even more important. Assuming that the raid leader is paying attention can be a dangerous mistake. I joined a pug LK10 last week, and I unabashedly called out each time I needed help. It covers my ass. If I'm asking for heals on the tank and the tank dies, I did the best I could do and I am not the only one to blame. If I ask for heals on the tank and the tank lives, I've saved us from a wipe. Was it actually necessary? It's hard to say, if they other healers were good they saw it on their raid frames that I was valked or in the dream or in the sword, and were adjusting before I called it out. But again, that's making some pretty serious assumptions.
I'm not an expert on when to call out and when not to. I'm sure that I've called out the most unnecessary things, while keeping my mouth shut when I shouldn't have. Most of the time, it wouldn't wipe the raid if I didn't (or would it?). It's not a chance I want to take. I'll call it out just in case.
I'm sure half the raid thinks "ugh I wish she would just shut up sometimes", but they can deal. I'm not trying to be self-important, I'm trying to give us the best shot we have of boss kills and shiny lootz. Given the choice, I'm sure they'd prefer that I'm calling out my status than calling them out. How many times do you have to be mind controlled before you learn to bite, hmm? (Whoops, the Bitch came out after all!)
What do you call out in your raids? Do you help announce timers, remind players to focus an add, or speak out when you are locked down by a raid mechanic? Do you appreciate it when your tanks and healers are proactive in vent, or does that healadin drive you crazy?
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Healers Who Don't Wanna
Have you noticed a trend in healers who don't wanna?
I have, but I'm not sure that I qualify to talk about it. Most of my memories from the beginning of the expansion was focused primarily in 10's, where we had a semi-steady group where we would pug at least a warm body or two. We ended up in some pretty strange Naxxs - three holy paladin teams (never again!), hardly ever any heroism, retribution paladins ahoy.
The one thing I remember frustrating the snot out of me was a shortage of 'main spec' healers. We'd always end up finishing the group by inviting another dps and asking the priest/druid/paladin to switch (grumble, grumble) to their offspec. And more often than not, it would sour the rest of the evening because they couldn't just say "I'm here to dps. I don't have fun healing."
(Better yet - don't keep a holy/resto off spec!)
Rant completed, I haven't run into this in a while, but like I said: I do 25s with a raiding guild. A set roster and steady group decrease my chances of running into healers who don't wanna. We have enough (close to it) healers who prefer to heal. The dps who heal offspec riptide with the same vigor of lava burst.
So I'm curious. I've "noticed" that there are less now, but I'm not looking for them either. Lately, have you run into healers who don't wanna?
(Quick note: If you're a dps who enjoys healing and/or tanking too, I love you.)
I have, but I'm not sure that I qualify to talk about it. Most of my memories from the beginning of the expansion was focused primarily in 10's, where we had a semi-steady group where we would pug at least a warm body or two. We ended up in some pretty strange Naxxs - three holy paladin teams (never again!), hardly ever any heroism, retribution paladins ahoy.
The one thing I remember frustrating the snot out of me was a shortage of 'main spec' healers. We'd always end up finishing the group by inviting another dps and asking the priest/druid/paladin to switch (grumble, grumble) to their offspec. And more often than not, it would sour the rest of the evening because they couldn't just say "I'm here to dps. I don't have fun healing."
(Better yet - don't keep a holy/resto off spec!)
Rant completed, I haven't run into this in a while, but like I said: I do 25s with a raiding guild. A set roster and steady group decrease my chances of running into healers who don't wanna. We have enough (close to it) healers who prefer to heal. The dps who heal offspec riptide with the same vigor of lava burst.
So I'm curious. I've "noticed" that there are less now, but I'm not looking for them either. Lately, have you run into healers who don't wanna?
(Quick note: If you're a dps who enjoys healing and/or tanking too, I love you.)
Friday, July 30, 2010
Healing Through It (Blood Queen and Sindragosas)
I joke with healers that we're often responsible for healing through lots and lots of things. Except it's not a joke. Or... it only kinda is.
The Blood Wing - Know My Hunger
Princes didn't give us much heartache all things considered, even if we ignored them for months (and months) while we were kiting things around in the Plague Wing. Blood Queen, however, was another matter.
The Blood Queen almost destroyed our guild. The queen started fights, incited nerd rages, and got people kicked from our guild. She scared away raid applicants, created new vent and wipe-calling rules, and organized walk outs. For more than two months she's terrorized us (two minute cooldown), and even on the weeks we couldn't get to her, she was still lurking overhead, reminding us that if we do get down Putricide this week, we'll be bowing before her.
Everything gave us troubles. Bite-addon insanity, bloodbolt whirl death traps, red triangles of doom, (creative) passive-agressive use of shadow trails, and the bites. Oh, the bites! I lagged, my target ran away from me, I got feared, 2 FPS, I didn't know who I was supposed to bite, I thought I had another 30 seconds, I never got the whisper, wait do I got to the bitee or does he come to me?, but you told me to bite the MT, and the ever popular "So what do I do when I get bit, again?".
We did some crazy things. Folks switched offspecs. My holy priest dropped her shadow off in favor of Discipline, and wins the "excellence in a new spec for a progression boss" award. We had healers make minor changes to glyph and spec, we had DPS make major changes to their offspecs to be available to heal (and I really appreciate it, even if they made all those changes for just one night). We recruited, we brought alts, we declared new mains, and we made it happen. Hurray for 30%!
A First Peek Into the Frost Wing
The best way to celebrate a victory on a boss you've been working on for months is (obviously) to go bang your head on a brand-new one. And herein lies the good news. We didn't get Sindragosa down, but we owned the hell out of phase 1.
All the people who had done this fight on ten had spent time warning everyone in G chat (for months) about how hard Sindy is gonna be, how this is gonna take REAL coordination and if they think BQ/Put/Princes is hard 'just wait till you see the frost queen'...
Compared to the BQ, our Lady Dragon is not frenetic, at least from a "healing through it" perspective. BQ is a fast fight, Sindy is slow. Five of the six healers had already beaten Sindragosa on 10, so I was ridiculously optimistic about Sindragosa. I knew our hardest parts would be Blistering Cold and Ice Block placement. The stacks of debuffs were absolutely no problem. Even the Phase 1 ice blocks were well-handled (turns out that stuff we've seen before is easier to learn than altogether new mechanics...).
I thought I would be prepared (cleverly) and I coordinated with all the paladins to give specific players their Hand of Freedom cooldown for Blistering Cold. It was a great idea, in theory, except for I failed often enough at it in the first few attempts I had to use it for myself.
Blistering Cold was not a problem at all once we elected a hunter to Aspect of the Noob. It really works. The tank gets stunned but nothing a roll of hots couldn't fix while the less mobile healers are fleeing.
I'm sure we'll spent weeks on Phase 2, but I'm prepared for that. Suffer mortals, as your pathetic magic betrays you!
The Blood Wing - Know My Hunger
Princes didn't give us much heartache all things considered, even if we ignored them for months (and months) while we were kiting things around in the Plague Wing. Blood Queen, however, was another matter.
The Blood Queen almost destroyed our guild. The queen started fights, incited nerd rages, and got people kicked from our guild. She scared away raid applicants, created new vent and wipe-calling rules, and organized walk outs. For more than two months she's terrorized us (two minute cooldown), and even on the weeks we couldn't get to her, she was still lurking overhead, reminding us that if we do get down Putricide this week, we'll be bowing before her.
Everything gave us troubles. Bite-addon insanity, bloodbolt whirl death traps, red triangles of doom, (creative) passive-agressive use of shadow trails, and the bites. Oh, the bites! I lagged, my target ran away from me, I got feared, 2 FPS, I didn't know who I was supposed to bite, I thought I had another 30 seconds, I never got the whisper, wait do I got to the bitee or does he come to me?, but you told me to bite the MT, and the ever popular "So what do I do when I get bit, again?".
We did some crazy things. Folks switched offspecs. My holy priest dropped her shadow off in favor of Discipline, and wins the "excellence in a new spec for a progression boss" award. We had healers make minor changes to glyph and spec, we had DPS make major changes to their offspecs to be available to heal (and I really appreciate it, even if they made all those changes for just one night). We recruited, we brought alts, we declared new mains, and we made it happen. Hurray for 30%!
A First Peek Into the Frost Wing
The best way to celebrate a victory on a boss you've been working on for months is (obviously) to go bang your head on a brand-new one. And herein lies the good news. We didn't get Sindragosa down, but we owned the hell out of phase 1.
All the people who had done this fight on ten had spent time warning everyone in G chat (for months) about how hard Sindy is gonna be, how this is gonna take REAL coordination and if they think BQ/Put/Princes is hard 'just wait till you see the frost queen'...
Compared to the BQ, our Lady Dragon is not frenetic, at least from a "healing through it" perspective. BQ is a fast fight, Sindy is slow. Five of the six healers had already beaten Sindragosa on 10, so I was ridiculously optimistic about Sindragosa. I knew our hardest parts would be Blistering Cold and Ice Block placement. The stacks of debuffs were absolutely no problem. Even the Phase 1 ice blocks were well-handled (turns out that stuff we've seen before is easier to learn than altogether new mechanics...).
I thought I would be prepared (cleverly) and I coordinated with all the paladins to give specific players their Hand of Freedom cooldown for Blistering Cold. It was a great idea, in theory, except for I failed often enough at it in the first few attempts I had to use it for myself.
Blistering Cold was not a problem at all once we elected a hunter to Aspect of the Noob. It really works. The tank gets stunned but nothing a roll of hots couldn't fix while the less mobile healers are fleeing.
I'm sure we'll spent weeks on Phase 2, but I'm prepared for that. Suffer mortals, as your pathetic magic betrays you!
Monday, December 28, 2009
A Rant - Down those adds already!
Most guilds canceled their sanctioned raids for this week so Mayhem and I decided to put together an ICC25 last night. Before we were even finished with the random H, we got whispers asking us if we wanted to come join a group. I should have known it wasn't going to go well when we started getting whispers from other members of the raid telling us to hurry up, they were getting tired of waiting for us (to finish a 5 man). When I had agreed to go, I had made it clear we were going to finish up our run and then join the group. We finally did join and they aren't even full, they are still looking for more dps. I get summoned in, and I get prompted to get saved.
I really have only two pieces of gear that need replacing ASAP. Everything else I have is at least 245, but I'm sporting the Naxx shield, so I really should do Marrowgar every week to get that replaced. I was a little disappointed that when I was invited no one had bothered to mention it wasn't a full run (on top of getting random whispers telling me to hurry up when they weren't even ready), seeing some of the names on the raid roster made me wonder just how much fail this run is going to be.
Oh, the fail was... fail. The RL was newer to the fight (which was fine), but there were no solid explanations given. Curses were falling off instead of being dispelled. Adds were multiplying like baby rabbits in a cartoon. Death and Decay was flying around and killing everyone (oh wait. It doesn't move. All you have to do is step out of it and then it can't hurt you). Mayhem "took over" a bit at this point and gave out some solid assignments for groups and some general expectations for this fight. Everyone was complaining because target switches hurt their dps, they wanted to be able to stay on the boss (I've heard that complaint from every class now. Everyone loses DPS when they switch target, quit QQing and down those adds already!) Three our four tries later, they call it because people have to go, which was fine, we never got past the second wave of adds so it wasn't like we had made progress.
In vent chat we heard that they had no plans of continuing the save (they weren't raiding again until after reset), so we decided to put a new group together and get back in there for a couple more hours. It ended up being kinda funny because not only did a handful of people from the first run end up joining us again, but the old RL did too. Mayhem let him know we weren't trying to be shady, we just wanted to keep working on something we had started, and so did he.
Our second group went a lot smoother, although having the DPS to down the adds was still a huge problem. We decided to go with five healers, which scared one of our other healers (usually an awesome ele shaman, he went resto). We whispered each other back and forth, he was most afraid for being blamed for not being able to heal through stupid. I assured him if anyone was dying from stupid, I'd be calling it out on vent.
And I did. Immediately. I only had to say something the first two times someone stood in Death and Decay, because once people realized that they would be called out by name, they hauled ass to not be named. I am not mean about it. In fact, I'm super-sticky-sugary-sweet about it and I've been told that the more frustrated I am, the more patient I sound. Our group was really good with getting out of DnD and dispelling the curse - more than once I was cursed and it was off before I could even ask for it. That's awesome dispelling.
We still weren't able to get her down, because we kept getting overwhelmed with adds. I don't want to blame the DPS for that entirely - it was only certain individuals who were not following directions. When a tank died from a mutant, we called for a battle rez. It was then I noticed that our feral druid was still merrily focusing the boss, oblivious to all the dying (he was assigned to a side, not the boss). In fact, we had a handful of people doing it. Even more amazing is that after we called out certain people by name to not be on the boss while there are adds up, they still did it the next wipe.
Anyways. Lady D is going to be a bane fight until the DPS can outgear it, because asking all 17 to work together is apparently a lot to ask for. I normally don't mock people as blatantly as I have in this post, but the recurring theme with all of my failures this week is "someone else didn't do what they needed to do so I didn't get my badges". It's really frustrating to know you brought your A game and pulled out some of the best tricks in your playbook (with less healers), to see two rogues and a kitty not follow directions because their personal standing on the wipe-meter is more important than the group getting a kill. The lesson learned here is that next time the kicks will be swift. I am patient and understanding about people learning fights, but I have no patience for anyone who refuses to be a team player in an MMORPG. If our strat is bad, let's talk about making it better; abandoning the strat and doing your own thing will always be a wipe. And why are we wiping? Get those adds down so we can get to Phase 2 already!
TL;DR: Healing encounters is easy, healing stupid players is hard. Also get those adds down so we can get our loot already!
I really have only two pieces of gear that need replacing ASAP. Everything else I have is at least 245, but I'm sporting the Naxx shield, so I really should do Marrowgar every week to get that replaced. I was a little disappointed that when I was invited no one had bothered to mention it wasn't a full run (on top of getting random whispers telling me to hurry up when they weren't even ready), seeing some of the names on the raid roster made me wonder just how much fail this run is going to be.
Oh, the fail was... fail. The RL was newer to the fight (which was fine), but there were no solid explanations given. Curses were falling off instead of being dispelled. Adds were multiplying like baby rabbits in a cartoon. Death and Decay was flying around and killing everyone (oh wait. It doesn't move. All you have to do is step out of it and then it can't hurt you). Mayhem "took over" a bit at this point and gave out some solid assignments for groups and some general expectations for this fight. Everyone was complaining because target switches hurt their dps, they wanted to be able to stay on the boss (I've heard that complaint from every class now. Everyone loses DPS when they switch target, quit QQing and down those adds already!) Three our four tries later, they call it because people have to go, which was fine, we never got past the second wave of adds so it wasn't like we had made progress.
In vent chat we heard that they had no plans of continuing the save (they weren't raiding again until after reset), so we decided to put a new group together and get back in there for a couple more hours. It ended up being kinda funny because not only did a handful of people from the first run end up joining us again, but the old RL did too. Mayhem let him know we weren't trying to be shady, we just wanted to keep working on something we had started, and so did he.
Our second group went a lot smoother, although having the DPS to down the adds was still a huge problem. We decided to go with five healers, which scared one of our other healers (usually an awesome ele shaman, he went resto). We whispered each other back and forth, he was most afraid for being blamed for not being able to heal through stupid. I assured him if anyone was dying from stupid, I'd be calling it out on vent.
And I did. Immediately. I only had to say something the first two times someone stood in Death and Decay, because once people realized that they would be called out by name, they hauled ass to not be named. I am not mean about it. In fact, I'm super-sticky-sugary-sweet about it and I've been told that the more frustrated I am, the more patient I sound. Our group was really good with getting out of DnD and dispelling the curse - more than once I was cursed and it was off before I could even ask for it. That's awesome dispelling.
We still weren't able to get her down, because we kept getting overwhelmed with adds. I don't want to blame the DPS for that entirely - it was only certain individuals who were not following directions. When a tank died from a mutant, we called for a battle rez. It was then I noticed that our feral druid was still merrily focusing the boss, oblivious to all the dying (he was assigned to a side, not the boss). In fact, we had a handful of people doing it. Even more amazing is that after we called out certain people by name to not be on the boss while there are adds up, they still did it the next wipe.
Anyways. Lady D is going to be a bane fight until the DPS can outgear it, because asking all 17 to work together is apparently a lot to ask for. I normally don't mock people as blatantly as I have in this post, but the recurring theme with all of my failures this week is "someone else didn't do what they needed to do so I didn't get my badges". It's really frustrating to know you brought your A game and pulled out some of the best tricks in your playbook (with less healers), to see two rogues and a kitty not follow directions because their personal standing on the wipe-meter is more important than the group getting a kill. The lesson learned here is that next time the kicks will be swift. I am patient and understanding about people learning fights, but I have no patience for anyone who refuses to be a team player in an MMORPG. If our strat is bad, let's talk about making it better; abandoning the strat and doing your own thing will always be a wipe. And why are we wiping? Get those adds down so we can get to Phase 2 already!
TL;DR: Healing encounters is easy, healing stupid players is hard. Also get those adds down so we can get our loot already!
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