Raid Night: Karazhan

Tonight we hit up Karazhan for our weekly badge run. We took down Attumen, Moroes, Maiden, and Big Bad Wolf in 89 minutes. The last two hours were devoted to Nightbane (one shot), Curator (one shot), and Illhoof (3 shot). I picked up Barbed Choker of Discipline off of Maiden, replacing an embarrassing blue.

We picked up 13 badges, bringing my current total to 73. That led Aeth and I into a conversation about the badge chest pieces. He pointed me to Maintankadin, a forum for paladin tanks. There, I found a list of epic tanking gear. The three chest pieces that were discussed, Chestplate of Stoicism, Chestguard of the Stoic Guardian, and Shattrath Protectorate's Breastplate. I was pretty set on the Breastplate, due to the high spellpower and spellhit, but according to the list its pretty low. The Chestplate and the Chestguard are both in the #3 spot, and I am kind of torn. I will most likely end up getting the Chestplate, as it is more stamina.

Either way, I will have finally replaced a blue with an epic. Then all thats left is my shoulders. I have thought about running Heroic Sethekk alot to get them, but they are the lowest epic shoulders you can get. I will have more luck getting them off of High King, or the first timed chest from ZA, of which we are about to get.

All in all it was a good night. Looking forward to ZA on Thursday.

Raid Night: Zul'Aman

We hit up Zul'Aman with the help of Avalanche (70 Night Elf Druid [Feral]) and Kelwinn (70 Night Elf Druid [Restoration]) from Amicitia. We got to the Bear Boss without a major problem, but wiped on the first try. We were close to the timer too, but we were able to get him on the second try. I got Jungle Stompers, which is great as its the first piece on spec that I have gotten out of ZA. I bought a +15 Stamina gem for them.

We made the Eagle Boss gauntlet with no problems. Kelwinn remarked that we had a good system for the gauntlet. We knocked down the Eagle with no problems, and Saffrin (70 Night Elf Druid [Restoration]) picked up Brooch of Nature's Mercy.

Avalanche showed us a short cut up to the Lynx, which saved us about 45 minutes of trash pulls. We were able to give the Lynx 3 shots, and the second one had him down to 12% before he enranged, killing me with a 115,000 (yes, thats right) crit. I don't think he will be killing us too much often.

It was a good night, but still haven't progressed. Soon.

Playing Catch Up

I have had a terribly busy week in real life, which has kept me away from my blog. A thousand apologies. Here is some quick notes about the last few days.

Horde Monday! We had 9 people on, and played two games of Warsong Gulch. Most of our group was 39, I was only 36. I led in both games (Horde and Alliance) for Killing Blows, Honor Kills, and Damage. It truly, truly amazes me that I am able to outclass all the other DPS when I am 3 levels lower. Rhianne seems to think its because I have played a hunter before, so I know how to be successful. Maybe everyone else just sucks. :D (joke there, calm down Dragon)

Raid Night: Karazhan! On Tuesday we didn't have enough geared players to do ZA, so we went into Kara and got through the Curator. Everything seemed slow to me. We have gotten through Shade (with Illhoof and Nightbane down) on one night. I think we are going to start splitting the week up between ZA, and Kara badge runs. This should help us get the SSO loot gear quicker.

I didn't play at all on Wednesday, other than to log into my auction house alts and scan the AH.

Tonight is ZA. Hopefully we will get off the ground tonight. If not, might do a Heroic or two.

Raid Night: Zul'Aman

Last night, we went into Zul'Aman again. We were just running in to fight Nalorakk, when the timer ran out. We should have the Bear boss down on Thursday by the timer. That will be a great success for us in my opinion. Aeth got the Mask of Introspection for his healing set, and might I say, this is a wild looking helm.

We had some trouble with the Eagle boss again this week. It seems like this guy is feast or famine for us, but when we did get him down after the second gauntlet run everyone seemed to get it. While I say he is on farm, its annoying to wipe on him. I picked up Bloodstained Elven Battlevest for my dps set.

We made our way to the Lynx boss with only a couple of wipes, and tried him three times. Twice he was pulled accidentally by healers, and the middle time we had some other healing problems which caused me to go down quickly. The boss has a big Saber Lash which does 12K-18K damage, but splits it between the two tanks. It seemed like I kept eating the full lash. Our off-tank was in position correctly, and he took a full lash as well during the second attempt. I am not sure we can do anything else about it, other than to get Isbaern's health up above 18K.

We got the first two bosses down now, we just need to start working on getting the trash pulls on the way to them down. Once we do that, we will have a better chance of having more shots on Lynx. Since we started ZA, we have faced the Lynx 7 times with no luck.

Raid Night: Zul'Aman

For the first time in three weeks, we were able to get a Thursday Zul'Aman run in. Over all, it was a night very similar to Tuesday. The raid had reset, so we had all the bosses to do over again, which is fine with us. Again this week, we had problems with the stupid gong. Took a couple of minutes to get the timing down. I wonder what the trick is.

We did the four pulls up to the Bear boss, with a minor hiccup during the third pull. Once we got to Narolakk, it was an easy nine minutes. Although, I did have to have a Battle Rez near the end of the fight. Jaralon (70 Draenai Hunter) got Fury.

We moved on to the Eagle boss guantlet, and wiped the first shot. It was the first time we have wiped on it so far. While a downer, we were able to get it the second time. I still contend its a fun fight. We gave a shot on the Eagle, but I was killed after the first collapse. The second try was a success, and we took him down without a hitch. Guill (70 Human Warrior) got Akil'zon's Talonblade.

We had a number of wipes on our way to the Lynx, including another with the last Akil'zon's Handler pulls, as none of them we were able to crowd control. We finally made it to the Lynx boss with about 20 minutes left in our time. This gave us two shots. The first time, we wiped after the first split, with the boss at 58%. The second shot had us wiping at 59%. I took a 16,800 last from him, and survived. Rhianne and I were both amazed.

The Lynx is a tough fight, and we are going to need more time with him to get him down. I expect it will happen next week. We need to wipe less on the trash, even if our unofficial name is "Wipes on Trash" (the future second raiding team will be called "Did You Get The Quest?"). Once that happens, we will be able to get the timer mission down. Especially the first boss. Its only a matter of time.

I expressed that I felt I wasn't doing a good job leading this raid, but Rhianne said that she felt the same way during the early days of Kara. I would have never thought that, as she always seemed so cool about it. I am going to try to choke down that feeling in the future.

Good run tonight. Looking forward to getting down the Lynx next week, and getting Kara this weekend.

Raid Night: Zul'Aman

We had a great night in ZA, much like our first run in there two weeks ago. We had a few hiccups on the Bear boss pulls, but were able to teach the 4 new people we had the fights. We only had one mage tonight, Hawtas (70 Dranaei Mage [Fire]), so some of the CC was tough. Once we got to the boss though, it was smooth sailing. Our second tank, and former Keeper Guill (70 Human Warrior [Protection]) and I clicked along perfectly. At one point, I went down, but our healer Saffrin (70 Night Elf Druid [Resto]) gave me a quick battle rez, and I was able to pick up my rotation without a problem. She was quite good tonight. Took 9 and a half minutes, but we got him down. Rhianne got Bladeangel's Money Belt.

We moved over to the Eagle boss gauntlet, and took it down again in one shot. It just doesn't seem to be a problem for us, even though alot of people complain about how hard it is. We just haven't seen it, and its a fun, fast paced fight.

We got to the Eagle, explained the in and out rotation during the storms, and got to it. I pulled the boss before Guill could get his dps gear on, oops. We moved through the fight very easily. Hawtas went down early, but another battle rez got him back into the fray. We seemed to have the collapsing and expanding out perfectly, and with 22 seconds left on the frenzy timer we downed him. I got the Chestguard of Hidden Purpose for my healing set.

We took a break, and came back for our run to the Lynx boss. We had a few more wipes during these pulls, which put us way behind. By the time we got to the Lynx himself, it was 11:30pm server time, and we could only give him one shot. We made it through the first split, but lost a couple of people early to the lighting totems and it was a wipe.

Would like to thank our friends at the Champions of the Realm (rotten name stealer's!) for joining us this week. Looking forward to having you out on Thursday.

No ZA, Slave Pens, alt leveling, and blogger update

Blogger has been up and down the last couple days, so I apologize for not updating more regularly.

Wednesday: I didn't play at all. Took the day off, and enjoyed playing a rousing best of five game of Fluxx with the missus.

Thursday: We tried to get ZA going, but we were short a tank. Our second, Isbaern was out of town on business, so he couldn't go with us. Most of our friends were in SSC. After that we tried doing Heroic Magister's Terrace, but we just couldn't get it together, and went to Heroic Slave Pens instead. We wiped once, and finished in less than an hour.

Friday: I played around with my Rogue, Adormra, and hit 44 with him. I am getting alot more comfortable with the class, and am looking forward to doing some on level instances runs in my 60's.

Zul'Aman: The Long Road Back

About 10 days after patch 2.3 hit, and Zul'Aman was opened, the Keepers went in there to see the place and give the first boss a try. We were told that it was hard, and boy was it. We couldn't get pass the 2nd pull up to the Bear boss. We were disheartened. About six weeks later, we went in there again, but couldn't get the last pull before the Bear. Again, we were disheartened.

Enter tonight. We were prepared, had flasks and food for everyone. We had a couple of blips on our way to Bear. The first shot, we didn't have the tanks correctly positioned. In the second try, I taunted the boss off of Isbaern (70 Night Elf Warrior [Protection]), which caused us to wipe. On the third try, Isbaern and I had the switching back and forth perfectly, and were able to down the Bear! Xanice (70 Human Priest [Holy]) got a cool healing robe.

We moved over to the Eagle guantlet, and began. I was in the rear, taking down the elites from the back, so I wasn't able to see much of the fight. We killed the birdman, and explained the Eagle boss to everyone. We started the fight, and things went perfectly. We were able to collapse and reform with perfect timing, the heals were great, and the dps was steady. We finished the fight with five players up, but we downed the boss the first shot! We were so proud! Isbaern picked up a chest piece for his dps set.


We took a couple of swipes at the Lynx boss, without any luck. We need some more time to work on it. Maybe we will get him down on Thursday.

I am so proud of the guild for getting these two bosses down! We have another shot at them on Thursday, and I am really looking forward to this!

WIDT: Horde Monday!, Dueling outside Ironforge

I logged on to Wyndi tonight to see if there was an open spot, but there wasn't. A third group is being formed, but other toons are farther behind me. I may have to wait another month maybe? I don't relish that. I had such a good time running in Scarlet Monastery last time, I just want to get a run in.

After I logged off, I headed over to Adormra, my Rogue, and got through most of 42. I only have a few bars, but a real-life friend wanted to join the guild, so I logged onto Asher.

I invited my friend Nano, to the guild and we chatted for a bit. Then I dueled Rhianne and Hawtas, beating both. When fighting Rhianne, we were banging on each other, and she got me down to about 1500hp. I popped Lay on Hands (instant heal for 14k), stunned her out of her heal, and beat her down the last couple thousand hp. It was a nice duel, and I had to pop a cooldown to win. Good fight, Rhi.

Tomorrow is ZA. I am worried.

Last Nights Raid

We went into Karazhan for our last, regularly scheduled Kara run last night. We took out Nightbane, Illhoof, Shade, and Chess. We bounced off Prince 4 times, including a heartbreaking 1% wipe on our 3rd try. I really wish we could have tried him a few more times, but it was already the end of our scheduled raid time.

So next week starts ZA on Tuesday and Thursday. Looking forward to it.

Last Week of Karazhan

We ran Karazhan tonight. This is our last week regularly inside Karazhan, before we move on to Zul'Aman. I am of mixed feelings about this. Karazhan was really huge, and awesome. It was hard at first, but got much easier as time went on. The few times we have done ZA have been dismal failures, but this time we are better geared, and ready to go.

Our DPS felt a bit slow tonight. We only got through Curator, and didn't get Nightbane down this week. A noob mistake cost us the first shot before it even got started, then the second try was stopped in the %60's when I kept getting feared. I have yet to successfully tank him, but I think once I get my stamina up, things will be better. I have 71 badges now, so 29 to my new tanking chest off the Shattered Sun Badge vendor.

I am expecting to have a rough go for the first couple weeks. I think we can get the bear boss down, without much of a problem. I am working on learning the strategies for the fight, I just hope I lead well. Not used to it.

Karazhan

This was my 50th run into Karazhan tonight. We tore through the place. Killed through Shade, getting Nightbane and Illhoof along the way. It was a good night for all.

Two more weeks till ZA. I am pumped, but I need to work on gear. New helm and chest piece is top of my list.

It was good to have Drask out with us tonight. I don't get to run enough with him, since he left for Amicitia.