Azeroth was screwed

At Azeroth’s darkest moment, it depended on a motley crew of about 20 heroes (and that is questionable) to defeat Archimonde and keep him from destroying the world tree. I pity the world if they really were saved by the group of people I joined in Hyjal on saturday night. The pug consisted of about seven people from my guild, six from a 70-capped raiding guild called Glory Days, and a smattering of other random 80s.

It must have been a full moon or something, because there were some colorful personalities in that pug. The leader spent the entire raid falling behind and taking forever to dispense loot. There was a ret pally who was constantly screaming in all caps for a SUMMON to Hyjal, or for some friend of his to be SUMMONED, or for him to be SUMMONED because he fell off a cliff. I use all caps because that’s how communicated, petulantly and in a demanding, infantile manner. I wanted to reach through the Internet and slap him.

He must have been some 12 year old kid spending a saturday night being babysat by the Internet, because I can’t imagine a high-functioning adult could ever behave in the way he did. It’s just not possible.

When we were meeting in the Night Elf village to head down to Archimonde, the warlock ran off the cliff, somehow aggro’d Archimonde, was one shot, and then caused the boss to immediately kill everyone in the zone. I was standing up next to Tyrande, saw everyone suddenly drop dead and a golden sheath of light burst from me. “Oh, hey, AD procced.”

Once we pulled it became obvious that, of course, many of the assembled dopes didn’t get their tears and eventually fell to their deaths. It was fun watching the squares on grid of each mouth-breather one by one turn grey to reflect their easily prevented-demise.

And let’s talk for a second about the stupidity of this strict-70 raiding guild that organized the run. How are you a strict TBC raiding guild when you depend on 80s to carry you through lvl 70 content? Like the old robot adage goes, “does not compute.” Basically they organized the run (and I use that word as loosely as possible), took all the loot they wanted since they could make the loot rules, barely contributed (if at all–most of the mouth-breathers were wearing Glory Days tags), and then when we finished were like “ok, let’s go to Sunwell!” I could not drop group faster.

5/8

After we fled that clusterfark, those of us that went to Hyjal continued our bored old-school raiding antics and went to BWL at someone’s suggestion. I am always game for BWL because I’m trying to compile a full Judgement set. After scoring the Judgement Spaulders off of Chromaggus that night, I’m now at 5/8. Just the chest, boots, and belt to go. I think my ultimate goal is to assemble the full judgement gear, my Thunderfury (still waiting on your binding, Garr, you jerk), and some equally awesome shield, and then (if this is possible with the new system) queue up for a random Stratholme and run some levelers through the place. It will be bewilderingly awesome, especially since as an 80 nothing will be able to hit me for much, regardless of what gear I’m wearing.

Three more Kingslayers

Last night finally saw the end to the latest 10man lockout I’ve been running. I do a 10man once a week in ICC and we usually just extend the lockout until we finish it up, then shake the roster up a bit. My big goal for this lockout was to get the LK kill for some people that run in other groups, so we could have a second 10man doing hardmodes and getting some 264 loot. Now that that’s done, the next lockout I run will be more focused on hard mode progression and less on another LK kill.

Our second LK kill wasn’t anymore difficult than the last one, I think we got him on the fifth attempt or so. Defiles are pretty much cake once you get everyone focused and hyper aware (though, I say this in 10man, where I can weed out those incapable of paying attention) and Valks are a non-issue with a 15% buff. We had some initial trouble with Infest, but that’s only because we were so used to having our pro disc healer neutralizing them before they ever became an issue. How complacent we were.

I’m mostly looking forward to taking my guild into the 25man version of this fight, but also terrified at the thought of it. We’ll see how it goes when the time comes for the greater group of us to face down Arthas.

Three years in the making

Happy birthday Gulliveig!

Lastly, I would be remiss if I didn’t wish a very happy birthday to my pal, Gulliveig.

Check out the cake my girlfriend (she of the Rhidach Cake) made for his birthday party Friday:

A pug shaman surrounded by troll totems. Celebrating his two loves–pugs and shamanism. That pug face is kind of haunting, though.

Many happy returns, buddy.

Smell your best for the raid tonight!

I saw this tip mentioned on the blog Hunters Rhok, and wanted to spread it to you, my tanky brethren. The buff-giving items of the Love is in the Air event apply independently of flasks, food, etc., and can be used to give you and your fellow raiders an edge in ICC tonight and for the rest of the week.

Here’s what you can nab and from what

Lovely Thunder Bluff/Ironforge Card — Reward from the eponymous quests. Gives +30 stamina for one hour.

“STALWART” Cologne — Purchased for 5 tokens. Gives +20 defense rating (+.16% dodge, parry, block, and miss) for one hour.
“Forever” Perfume — Same as “STALWART”.

But wait, there’s more! (… a bug)

When you’re wearing perfume/cologne and stand next to someone with the opposite, you’ll both receive the Love is in the Air buff, giving +3% crit change. Sound good, right? In principle, but when Paladins (and some other classes) have this buff, you will not be able to auto-attack of use certain melee abilities.

Best way to prevent this is coordinate with your raiders and make sure everyone in melee is wearing either perfume or cologne, and don’t mix. If you notice you can’t auto-attack or use some spells, that’s why.

Do your dailies and grab these items. The cards at least are like having a free extra epic gem in your gear. Take advantage of it while you can!

Happy turkey day!

I hope everyone (at least, my American readers, and not you sneaky Canadians with your Thanksgiving in October and your Fourth of July on the first of July) has a great day full of overeating, pie, beer, and an early bed. Best holiday ever.

Be well, friends.

Let’s talk tankey… er, turkey

Home again, home again, jiggedy jig.

I’m finally back from my work trip to the Czech Republic (beautiful country, btw) and ready to get back into the blogging swing of things.

When I logged on this morning at 6:30 am, riddled with jet lag, I discovered it was Thanksgiving in game. Completely slipped my mind that I’d be coming back during a new holiday. Anyhoo, I ran through most of the achievements this morning, and I have some Pally-themed advice for those of you burning through the achievs as well.

The Turkinator is a bit rough, and more easily done on a low pop server or early in the morning/late at night when no one is on (like 6:30 in the morning perhaps). For us Paladins, the easiest way to do this is first make the following macro:

/target Wild Turkey
/cast Hand of Reckoning

Then do a circuit of Tirisfal Glades (or Elwynn Forest, if you’re into that sort of thing) and just mash whatever hot key you bound that macro to until 40 birds bite the dust.

For Tirisfal I recommend this path:

You should run into more than enough birds to complete the achievement just following the pink line. Moreover, I hear the area south of Scarlet Monastery has tons of birds, if you want to frontload your count a little.

I have no idea where the best turkey spots are in Elwynn (being a Hordie). If anyone could suggest for our Alliance friends an optimal path, I’d appreciate it.

Now, I need to start checking out what I’ve missed on mmo-champ. I’m sure lots has happened in my absence.