If You Can't Beat 'Em

Since my gaming PC is out of commission, I've been reduced to hunkering down before the glow of my laptop, so raiding has been put on hold. However, after getting used to finessing the latency, I've found 5-mans are within its capacity, and have been exploring the wonderful world of cross-server PuGs.

My experience so far has been about what you'd expect; groups have ranged from casually-paced and chatty, to dead silent and chain-pulling like there was a prize for clearing the dungeon in under five minutes. Many have been perfectly competent, and while some groups have ultimately failed and fallen apart due to unfamiliarity with the new Icecrown dungeons, I have yet to encounter any true incompetence. Don't worry, I'm sure it'll show up sooner than later. I think I can give no better endorsement than to say that I'm going to be using this thing every day, whereas I never used to run with PuGs. ...all those extra badges may or may not have something to do with it >_>

The new dungeons themselves have been fun, with some interesting mechanics. Bronjahm is quite possibly the coolest, both tactically and musically, while the latter half of Halls of Reflection is suitably demanding for everyone, especially tanks, which reminds me...

I love new Misdirection! No more DoT ticks using up the effect before the trash actually reaches the tank! I did prefer the original animation, and I'm not sure why it was changed, but eh...

Ok, finally, the mammoth in the room: the new ammunition engineering schematics from the Ashen Verdict faction. The Iceblade Arrow schematic requires Gnomish engineering, while the Shatter Rounds requisite specialization is Goblin. There has been much head-scratching concerning the explanation for segregating ammo-crafting in this way. For one thing, among end-game ranged weapons, bows and crossbows significantly outnumber guns. This makes one specialization much more desirable than the other, both for hunters who happen to be engineers themselves, and in terms of market value for non-hunter engineers. Granted, as a dwarf hunter who strictly runs 10-man raids, the best weapon available to me happens to be a gun, and I'll be putting my Goblin engineering to good use. Still, I can understand the frustration of 25-man raiders and non-dwarves generally.

No... You Guys Go On Ahead...

[2.GuildChannel][AwesomeTank]: Hey, need 1 more DPS for a run through all three new heroics!

...time passes...

[ReallyGreatHealer] whispers: Would you like to join our hFoS group? :)

Eidtalheg sighs

So, why am I sitting here, writing a blog post, like some kind of shut-in Twilight fan? Why am I not laying down a whithering hail of artillery upon the minions of the Lich King?

It is because I sinned against the gods of Geekdom in purchasing, rather than building, my newest PC, which has been nothing but an unstable hulk of silicon and various conductive metals since the day it arrived. As we speak, it is in the shop, where even the most highly-skilled technicians are at a loss as to how so much suck could be concentrated into a single machine.

In other words, if Arthas is victorious, and the civilizations of Azeroth are reduced to shambling mockeries of their former glory, you'll have only Gateway Computers to blame.

Don't Worry, Li'l Buddy

I'm a vegetarian.

New Directions, Shameless Plugs

I haven't had much of interest to comment on lately, though I fully expect that to change once 3.3 goes live and the guild starts hitting Icecrown. We've been spending a lot of time gearing people up in Ulduar, and farming ToC and Onyxia.

As there is little in either raid in the way of upgrades for Eidtalheg, and to avoid burnout, I've been spending quite a bit of time running heroics on my Death Knight, whose Armory link I've added to the sidebar, and learning the intricacies of tanking. It's fun! With luck, I'll be bringing her to an Ulduar gear-up night soon.

I've made a few changes to the blogroll; a couple of much-loved bloggers have decided to move on to other things, and I wish them the best. I've also added a few DK-centric blogs I enjoy.

Finally, I want to draw your attention to a webcomic drawn and written by tabletop-gaming cheerleader, guild-leader emeritus, and rather nice guy, Shawn Gaston. It's set in the grim dystopian steampunk future of a fantasy world, and features a mix of action, intrigue, and humor. You go there now!

From Hell's Heart, I Stab at Thee!

Yes, at long last, I've gotten my very own Yogg kill. Even after clearing the next tier of raiding content, and knocking out a number of Ulduar hard-mode encounters, finally beating He Who Haunts Orthodontists' Nightmares was still a supremely satisfying experience.

The night began with our guild's first attempt at the Assembly of Iron's hardest mode, killing Steelbreaker last. After learning and mastering the frantic shield-tranqing and add-killing of medium-mode over the past couple of weeks, the general impression was that taking down Steelbreaker last is, well... pretty easy. Yes, he has a 100% chance of killing whoever tanks him, but realistically, with fair DPS, he will go down soon after the first tank explodes.


We then made our way through Mimiron (within seconds of a death-free victory) and a repeat of Hodir and Vezax hard modes, and moved on to the endgame. This fight really comes down to execution on the part of the brain-room team; as long as everyone on the surface can stay alive and sane, getting to phase three well before the enrage is entirely a matter of pounding on Yogg's brain, and after a couple of false starts last night's group performed admirably.

Upon seeing phase three for the first time, my first impression was, "gee, there are a lot of Immortal Guardians!" This was followed quickly by, "gee, there are a lot of dead raiders!" But, with fewer missed portals during phase two the next time, and better damage allocation between Guardians and Yogg himself, our victory was secured.

Does Anyone Else's Pumpkin Smell Like Tangerines?

...I licked mine...

We're Coming For You, Giant Constellation Man!

Last night's raid was a thing of beauty. Now that we'd got a handle on Yogg, it was agreed that there was no time like the present to begin pushing through the requisite hard-mode boss fights to unlock Algalon, as well as those needed for Glory of the Ulduar Raider along the way. So, with some trepidation as we were lacking a couple of key raid buffs, we undertook the initial task of retrieving the Archivum Data Disk from the Assembly of Iron. It took a few tries, but once we saw how Molgeim's adds behaved, we realized they could be AoE'd down before they had a chance to do much damage. Step one...

...complete!

Next up was Hodir. Since this hard-mode simply requires defeating the boss under a certain time limit, it is much like its normal counterpart - only moreso. Stacking all of the available buffs is non-optional. It is also necessary for the raid leader to know when to call for a wipe, to avoid accidentally killing Hodir after the timer has expired. Again, after a handful of tries...


...bam! We were rolling now.

Despite our newly-inflated confidence, we weren't quite intoxicated enough to push the Big Red Button, so after dispatching Mimiron the old-fashioned way, we decided to spend the last half hour of the raid on Vezax and the Saronite Animus. Without saronite puddles to stand in, mana efficiency becomes even more important for healers, which also means that not getting hit by life leech and shadow crash is even more important for the rest of the ranged. We gave it several attempts, the clock ticking ever closer to midnight, until, on what would have been our last attempt:


Victory!
/dance on a big dead lobster

So, yeah.