Long time no blog. Yes I’m alive, and yes still playing WoW. Been trying to find new things to do to keep my interest into Cataclysm. The rogue just didn’t do it for me, so there he sits with crap gear and 20-minute queue times.

So my latest thing then, BEAR TANK! I’d wanted to try to bear tank, since I’d done the paladin and warrior thing already, and have a level-capped druid. I’d already had some pieces but wanted to get at least a full set before trying to tank. So, I slapped on the healing gear and hit the LFG hard.

About 50-emblems in I saw a call for a “quick” ToC25 forming in trade that needed a healer. It was hosted by a reputable guild so I figured it’d be an easy run and I’ve healed it plenty of times. Getting badges outside the monotany of heroics was fine by me, and I figured I might be able to sneak off with a piece of tank gear.

And oh boy did I ever. So this is how things panned out:

A) Only druid in the raid.

B) All the rogues (and hunters) were ICC geared.

C) We were allowed unlimited offspec rolls.

Results

• Northrend beasts: Legwraps of the Broken Beast

• Lord Jaraxxus: Vest of Calamitous Fate
• Faction Champs: Icewalker Treads
• Twin Val’kyrs: Twin’s Pact

Seriously, that’s ridiculous. No one else needed or wanted any of that for offspec. I went to ToC on my rogue and not one piece of DPS leather dropped, and I’ve never seen that damn staff on my hunter. RNG is crazy. We didn’t kill Anub because suddenly everyone just forgot how to play, but I didn’t care. In less than an hour I got a bunch of badges and 4 pieces of iLevel 245 gear. Enchanted, gemmed (I’m kinda broke now) and mixed with the other gear I now have a competent tank set for heroics and probably some 10man raids. I must say, gearing a bear tank is significantly easier than a plate tank. It’s all druid loots!

Hesston and The Space Bunnies

No, that’s not my new indie-rock band. The Space Bunnies are the guild I’ve been in for the past few months in ICC. We’ve been doing well but have been plagued by no-shows and attendance issues. Raiding only 3 days a week and for only 3 hours, every night counts. We’d open the week on a Tuesday downing 8/12 and ready to work on progression, only to have a fraction show up on the following days. Though most seem to have excuses, I suspect people don’t want to come for the non-farm bosses. Progression or having a night of working on a single boss scares some people.

We’ve been trying to recruit, but every time we get someone another drops or has real life issues. To top it off, one of the officers got hacked the other night and they emptied the guild bank and deleted his toons. Come on people, don’t go to the free pet sites, nothing is free. Get a frakking authenticator damn it.

After that happened, I caught wind last night from the GM that there could be a disband this evening instead of a raid. Pretty much blows my plans for being part of a good guild going in to Cataclysm. I might still be able to join somewhere, but right now isn’t a great time. Many guilds are set on their HM-ICC progression or have their farm groups set. To try and get established past a trial status in a new guild is going to be annoying. We might try and form some 10-man groups and keep the guild together that way. For the most part I like the people I’ve been raiding with and don’t feel like getting used to a whole set of new personalities and attitudes.

Oh well, thus is WoW life. I’ve been having fun raiding even if we haven’t downed the Lich King. I’m sure we could have if we’d only gotten a few more dedicated raiders. The ones that did show every night had the skills to do it, we just lacked consistency and coordinating with new people every night screwed us.

Regardless, Hesston is more than geared enough to tackle the first bit of Cataclysm. I imagine the early dungeons will be laughable for ICC-geared folks. I wasn’t a raider then so I came into Wrath pretty green (literally), and have no idea what UK and The Nexus was like for the Sunwell folks. I imagine that was easy too.

What next?
BEAR TANK! I’m going to spend some time learning to claw, bite, swipe and growl my way through content. The druid will become a troll come Cataclysm, and I want him to be a geared to level easily as a bear. Though I could always laser chicken my way through. I have also vowed not to level any more alts until the expansion, not only because it is kind of pointless but also so that I don’t get burnt out. I still want to have the desire to level a new toon or two when the experience is fresh and interesting. I’m thinking goblin shaman perhaps, a healer.

Now that I think about, hunters are the only DPS class I really like. Every other class I play I either prefer tanking or healing. My one other pure DPS class, the rogue, hasn’t been as much fun as I thought it would be. I haven’t had much interest in a mage or warlock. And to be honest, I’m finding I enjoy tanking more than almost every thing else, which is funny because I used to be terrified of it. So far warrior tanking is clearly the most fun.

So that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.

For the Horde!

Categories: PvE, alts, raids
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Dong!…uh, I mean Ding!

So I’ve got yet another level 80 toon. This now puts it at five, though the DK doesn’t count since he’s technically only level 25. Still, after reading a post on WoW.com about the pains of leveling new characters, I kind of laughed. I mean honestly, it’s not that hard.

I started a rogue over the weekend and he’s at 24 already too. I’m not a hardcore player, even would put myself in the casual category. I have a full-time+ job, a girlfriend that doesn’t play WoW, and yet I still find it easy to muscle a character through the lower levels. Sure you hit some walls once in a while, but I find it a lot of fun learning the new mechanics of different classes.

I’d been tanking regular dungeons on my warrior, and recently graduated to the beginning heroics. Warrior tanking is so much more badass than paladin tanking. It feels more visceral and raw, no silly holy magic. We’ll have to wait and see if I like it when I’m struggling to hold mobs with thunderclap and just begging for a consecrate. Their whole style is just to beat things until they’re mad enough at you to want to kill you more than anything else in the room. Rawr!

Speaking of learning class mechanics, and to spread some personal epeen. I hit 80 on Sunday, ran some heroics as a DPS to get badges, made a shield and picked some assorted blue tank gear and started to tank stuff. Self-buffed HP just cresting 28K, and landed on Old Kingdom with random LFG. The healer was skeptical, but said he’d go ahead with it despite my low gear score. “Why thank you kindly sir, I do declare…”

About half way through, and I haven’t lost aggro once, didn’t die and we are moving right along. Healer (a disc priest) whispers: “Dude, you’re really good tank. A lot better than I thought you would be.”

/cast Puff chest

We continue, I tank everything fine. By the end of the run, after some discussion with party about gearscore and how my tanking was proof that it was bullshit, or at least a poor measure to judge someone, he’s asking if I’d be interested in server transferring. “Why sir, you at least have to buy me a drink first.”

Personally, I will admit I didn’t think Gronnd could tank much. But I did know that being defense capped was more important than raw HP, so I made sure I was at least over the 535 heroic cap. Tanked HoL and OK just fine, so I think I can just continue tanking without having to resort to DPS to collect badges. As long as I have a good healer it goes fine, but lately healers in heroics don’t want to actually have to try so they bounce if you don’t have 40K HP.

Hesston will take a backseat again as I continue experimenting with the tank, similar to my druid. It literally only took me a little more than two weeks of casual play to have him raid ready as a healer. I bet I can do the same as a tank.

Next up: Rogue, Shaman and then maybe the priest.

Categories: PvE, alts
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Last year I wrote a post about not being special when it comes to joining a guild. While there were some minor flaws in my thinking, I think the logic still stands. After running tons of random heroics using the LFG tool on multiple toons, this notion now extends to those runs as well.

You ever notice when, even after you spend a few minutes telling a group what to do and what not to do on a fight, they do it anyway or ignore your instructions. I’ve run into this a lot when using the LFG tool and it is usually a DPS’er or two that are guilty of the transgression. You tell the DPS to do X, and there’s always that one person that seemingly assumes you are talking to everyone else and not them and the they proceed to do ‘X.’ It happens in the same fights in the same instances every time.

So, I present a laundry list of as many oft-ignored “do/do not do X” moments that bug the holy crap out of me:

• “…don’t stand in the fires/void zones/poison/soul wells/ice patches/lightning.” (pretty standard)

• “…kill the casters first.”
• “…get behind the boss, don’t get cleaved.”
• “…kill the charming totems.”
• “…make sure the same person that loots the staff loots the headpiece.”
• “…wait here while the tank pulls the mobs around the corner.”
• “…free the people trapped in ice, especially the healer.”
• “…kill Skarvold first, then Dalronn.”
• “…move if you are getting hit in the face by the giant, spinning axe.”
• “…melee move out when the boss whirlwinds.”
• “…kill chaos rifts first.”
• “…don’t get hit by the ice spikes.”
• “…don’t forget to jump and remove your debuff.”
• “…kill the Skirmishers/Shadowcasters first.”
• “…wait for the boss to kill the adds before pull–shit…”
• “…stay behind the boss, don’t get hit by pound.”
• “…kill the Guardians when they show up then get back on the boss.”
• “…switch DPS to the add before it reaches the boss.”
• “…don’t get hit by the slow-moving purple shadow crash things.”
• “…stay at the top of the stairs, but don’t LoS from the healer.”
• “…kill the raptors when they come out then kill King Dred.”
• “…no one but the tank use your skeleton’s taunt ability.”
• “…get out of the poison.”
• “…kill Erekem first, then the adds.”
• “…one person use the crystals to kill the water adds.”
• “…if you have the void shift debuff, kill the adds.”
• “…spread out because of shatter, it’s like Gruul’s Lair.”
• “…kill the adds to free the person during Ritual of the Sword.”
• “…move to the side that the frost breath isn’t on.”
• “…one person get spears.”
• “…run away during Disperse.”
• “…get out of the Runeshapers’ whirlwind/kill them first.”
• “…move away during corrupt soul/kill the soul fragment.”
• “…get close to Bronjahm during phase two. YES, even you hunter.”
• “…stop DPS during Mirrored Soul.”
• “…move out of the big, frickin’ laser beam.”
• “…get behind the boulder and clear your debuff when the stacks get too high.”
• “…move out of poison puddles/poison nova.”
• “…run from boss if he is chasing you.”
• “…move out of the Explosive Barrage.”
• “…stop DPS if you have Overlord’s Bane.”
• “…if you are marked to get hit by Rimefang, get away from other players.”
• “…get out of the rogue’s poison.”
• “…kill the priests first.”
• “…turn away from boss when he casts Radiance.”
• “… don’t get hit by exploding ghouls.”

Oh I’m sure there are oodles more, but those are the first that come to mind and ones that I notice people ignoring the most. There’s one for almost every instance out there. Add to list in the comments if one pops to mind.

Happy hunting.

Categories: PvE, heroics
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So, after only having healed one ICC fight in 25-man I managed to find myself in a 10-man ICC guild run. Their hunter was AFK so they spammed trade for a fill in. I stepped up and assured them I could hold my own in the DPS department (though I will admit I was a little worried since I still had an Ulduar ranged weapon). However once we got in, I realized my DPS was fine. The ArmorPen spec and gear I am using right now does really well. Problem is, if I continue to get upgrades there is less and less ArP on hunter gear. Will probably have to scale it back and respec if I get more ICC/T-10 gear.

Speaking of the ranged weapon, I finally got rid of the gun and picked up the Njordnar Bone Bow. Really happy about this as I’ve needed a new ranged for some time. Though I do lose some ArP, the overall DPS increase is worth it. Plus arrows aren’t as noisy as bullets.

We one-shot everything but Saurfang, which took a few tries and the victory left me dead at the end (as you can see above). However, after being through all of the fights on my hunter I can now offer some tips. Of course, other guilds/groups may switch it up but this is how I saw things. Also, I’m only going to look at this from the 10-man perspective, including loot, since that’s what I saw.

Lord Marrowgar

This fight is relatively easy for hunters: stay at range, pew pew, get people down from bone spikes, run run run from fire…repeat. OK, not that easy. Everyone can stack near Marrowgar’s ass (if you can call it that), but hunters still have to stay at range. The best place to be is behind the folks standing close. Keep up the DPS and about 5 seconds before Bone Spike Graveyard you should close in so that if it cast on you the melee are closer and can get you down. If someone else gets spiked, immediately change targets and get them down.

Fire is easy to avoid, and if you are at this level of raiding it should be a simple matter of paying attention and moving. During Bone Storm avoid the fire first and Marrowgar second. If you can, continue to DPS. Right before Bone Storm is about to end, I throw a Misdirection on the tank picking him up and start firing. Keep this up and he should go down fairly easy.

Loot you may want
• Linked Scourge Vertebrae – Nice belt, with two sockets and some hit in case you need it to cap out or shuffle your spec around.
• Bone Warden’s Splitter – Nice axe to dual wield, if you’re into that. I’ve seen a few hunters with one of these and Quel’Delar (1H version), which is awesome for an ArmP setup. Would like to do that, but will have to pass on this unless there are no rogues, enhancement shamans or DW DKs in the group.

Lady Deathwhisper

At first this fight seems chaotic, as there are a lot of adds to remember, odd kill orders and other factors to consider at all moments. It’s even more hectic on 25-man. However, once you get a rhythm down it is relatively easy.

The first thing to know is that there will be Death and Decays going out all during the fight. This is the standard “get out of stuff on floor” part of this fight; move out of it! In 10-man, only one wave of 3 adds spawn at a time; adherents and fanatics. I believe we were tasked with killing the adherents first, then fanatics. If one casts Dark Martyrdom, try and burn them down ASAP. If they explode, they come back as skeletons immune to one type of damage. If it is a Fanatic, casters need to burn it down, if it is an Adherent, physical DPS (YOU) need to burn it down. Whenever there aren’t any adds up, DPS Deathwhisper to get her mana shield down. Once it is down, phase 2 begins.

During phase 2, burn burn burn. Deathwhisper will continue with DnDs, so move out of them. There will also be some untargetable spirits roaming around. Try and kite them if they are beating on you.

Loot you may want:
• Njordnar Bone Bow – Great bow with hit and crit. However, if you’re running around with a ranged from 25-man TotC, this will not be for you.
• Handgrips of Frost and Sleet – Yes please! Two red sockets (though bonus is meh), ArP and a lot of hit.

Gunship Battle

To be honest, I’m not sure of all of the factors going on in this fight. Rocket packs, cannons and craziness; that’s what I saw happening. My job was to kill the rifleman on the other ship. If this is your task, stand at the edge (but don’t fall off!), and just burn them down as they appear. After I got the first wave down, there was never more than two up. If your DPS is good enough you should be able to handle them solo. Call out for another ranged to help out if necessary. However, if your DPS is super duper and you get all of them down, you can turn around and help out with adds on your ship. The other ship will be firing rockets at you too. It puts a little mark on the ground similar to Mimiron rockets, just move aside. They’re super simple to avoid.

Seriously, I wish I had more advice on this fight. I didn’t even realize we’d won for a few minutes. Apparently though it’s not that hard, but I would like to experience this from a healer/tank perspective.

Loot you may want:
• Pauldrons of Lost Hope – Nice shoulders in the T10 model. ArP, haste and two sockets; not bad if don’t plan on getting the actual T10 shoulders any time soon.
• Icecrown Rampart Bracers – A red socket, more hit and crit. I think Blizzard is making up for the loss of ArP with the sockets and putting hit on items instead. This way, the ArP aspect of gear is left up to you through gems. I like this, as it gives more flexibility with some gear.

Deathbringer Saurfang

Now here’s where things get fun for hunters. Now, I love just DPS’ing as much as the next hunter, but being tasked with handling a specific mechanic in a fight is far more interesting to me. This fight gives hunters the chance to bring out some of their abilities which may be a little rusty.

Every 30 seconds Saurfang will summon two Blood Beasts. These need to be pulled and kited toward you and through a set Frost Trap. I positioned a few yards in front of the teleporter and would place my Frost Trap a few yards away from the bottom of the stairs. When the Blood Beasts spawned, we had one tank stun one of them while I used Distracting Shot to pull the other through the trap. You and the other DPS should burn it down and then kill the other one. If it gets too close, kite away and/or have a Boomkin Typhoon it back. It is VERY important that they don’t hit you or anyone else, as it gives Saurfang stacks of Blood Power. Hopefully you can kill the beasts in less than 15 seconds and can get back on the boss as much as possible before the next wave.

This is a mana intensive fight for hunters since you are using more abilities than normal, plus there isn’t much of a break to go into AotV. You want to do max DPS on Saurfang and kill the beasts as fast as possible. My suggestion, using a mana potion or, if totally necessary, use a Potion of Speed and go into AotV on Saurfang after you kill a wave of beasts. It’s hard, but can be done.

And damn it all if you get Mark of the Fallen Champion, which is what happened to me on our winning attempt. This person takes tons of damage and if they die Saurfang heals for 5% of his health. It sucks, but luckily I was the only one that died and they made it through. The guild I was with was pretty damn good and coordinated. So good in fact I decided to join them as a substitute after the run. So Hesston is in a guild again, w00t! Krakattoa might join him as well.

Loot you may want:
• Hauberk of a Thousand Cuts – Better than Crusader’s Dragonscale Breastplate, but not by much. The increased AP makes up for the lack of Agility, but the crit loss is made up as well. OK, maybe it is better. The loss of ArP is kind of bad, but if you need it there are the three sockets. I’d ignore the bonus.
• Saurfang’s Cold-Forged Band – Yes please! A socketed ring with a lot of AP, haste and ArP. Uh, I’d like this to go please.

So that’s what I know. The first gate of ICC is both challenging and fun and has a lot of great stuff for hunters. Can’t wait to see what the second wing has, if I can get in there. Take care, good hunting.

Categories: 3.3, PvE, guild, hunters, raids
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So after not being part of a raiding guild, I finally, finally, finally got to do a full clear of 25-man TotC. I know, it’s content everyone else has been farming already and the new raid is out. But I still haven’t been all the way through, until now. A guild of that I know has skilled members was filling some spots in a guild run so I figured what the hell.

The group formed nice and smooth, everyone hopped in vent and away we went. Minus one wipe on Faction Champs, first four bosses went down without a hitch. The RL said that they didn’t plan on going after Anub’Arak unless the DPS was high enough on first four bosses. Interestingly enough, every piece of hunter loot that I could use dropped, it was amazing.

But oh, did I forget to mention? I was on my fracking druid healing!

That’s right, both trips to a full TotC clear have NOT been on my hunter. As you may recall, I main tanked a few weeks ago, something I did not think I was capable of right now. But yeah, this time I was druid healing. I totally dig my druid and had a blast, but I do want to see how my DPS compares to others in a raid. Hesston’s gun is getting rusty damn it.

On the positive side, we did go and decide to give Anub’Arak a shot. What kind of shot you ask? Well a mofo one-shot, that’s what. Not only that, everyone was alive. And not only that, check out the overall for the entire raid meter to your left. Now I don’t put too much stock in healing meters because they don’t take into account a lot of factors, but I’m still pretty proud of that shit. Hell, I only started druid healing not too long ago. And hey, I even got a new belt out of the deal, as well as met some cool people.

This was a good test to see if I can raid heal and if my gear is ready to move in that direction. I am thinking of trying to join a raiding guild to see ICC with, but as a healer and not on Hesston. This was and will always be a hunter blog, but for now I’ve just decided it is just too hard to get into a raiding guild as not only a pure DPS class, but one of the most hated on of the pure DPS classes.

Plus, hunter DPS’ing just isn’t that challenging anymore. I recently put together an Armor Penetration spec with Hesston. It’s ridiculous how easy it is considering that once you have all the pieces, you take a shot OUT of your rotation to do more DPS. What!?

Like I said, I still love huntering, but until Cataclysm comes out and I do the great goblin hunter adventure, this blog might focus less on being a hunter and more about the life of my alts and WoW in general (unless of course something changes and I can raid on Hesston, because I would do it in a second). We’ll have to wait and see.

Take care. Good hunting.

Categories: PvE, alts, raids, screenshots
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So Hesston finally took the leap. I’d been planning to do this for a while but was thinking of waiting until after 3.3. But, I got antsy and decided to just go for it. I switched for a number of reasons but chief among them just for a change of scenery. And with the new LFG coming I think I will be be able to run a fair share of dungeons and enjoy things at my own pace. There are also some late-night raiding guilds on Horde side that I may consider later, but I don’t want to be tied down to anything.

The only thing that is crappy is having to re-do the Argent Tournament from scratch. Oh well, there’s always a price to pay (including the $30).

Oh, and my little druid is almost to Northrend, so that will be fun. Bought him dual-spec and will give tree healing a go, which is basically the polar opposite of paladin healing I’m sure.

For the Horde!

Categories: 3.3, PvE
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