Naxxramas Drinking Game

So I basically stole the idea and most of the rules from the original created by Vaer of Shadowsong (though with a few dopey rules removed and one or two added), and set up a raid tonight for Naxx10 with the following drinking game guidelines:

1) Killing a boss is a social, the entire raid drinks.

2) If you pick up a gray quality item (armor or weapon), you take a drink.

3) If you die, you take a drink.

4) If it is obvious you wiped the raid (Grobbulus clouds, etc.) you finish your drink.

5) Before you can accept a battle rez you must finish your drink.

6) If you die doing the Heigan dance you must drink continuously during each dance phase you are dead for.

7) If you miss the Thaddius ledge jump you finish your drink. Take a drink if you zap everyone.

8) If you fall off the pre-Gluth pipe finish your drink.

9) If you die on Frogger you must drink once for each person who made it through without dying. Immunity effects are a foul under penalty of chugging a fresh drink.

10) If you loot a green you direct someone else to take a drink (we’ll set the threshold up so everyone can loot greens, but then just pass them to a designated DE’r afterwards).

11) If Embrace of the Spider drops, we all toast Gulliveig and his shitty luck.

I’m interested to see how far we get… and if I’m coherent enough to remember to take screenshots.

The power of dkp, and a bonus story of delightful irony

So it’s official, my guild runs DKP. Were this a few months ago, I might be disappointed to report such a development, but today I’m actually quite happy. As you could tell from my raid recaps lately we’ve had major attendance issues, and after the last few nights I am feeling positive about DKP’s ability to fix these issues.

Sure, we’ve hit the same hiccups you’d expect from a guild adopting DKP for the first time. We had the dissenting quarters, populated mostly by those that raided very seldom and liked the thought that they could hop in once a week and maybe snag a purple. Which is all well and good, but ultimately this laissez faire attitude was hurting the guild and progression.

I look at DKP from the perspective of a hardened pragmatist. Human beings are rational creatures, and invariably will act in their perceived self-interest. Likewise, WoW players will act in a way that will maximize their loot intake. If a player knows that they’ll get the same amount of loot raiding one night a week then they will do that. However, shake up the system like we did and make it so raiding one night a week supresses how much loot you get on that one day (rather than having an even shot with everyone else in the raid) and they will be compelled to raid more often.

It’s simple economics.

There have already been several comments by guildmembers saying something along the line of “when’s the next raid?”, “does x raid I never attend give DKP?”, and so on. They feel compelled to accumulate the green points, to maximize their shot at loot, and will act accordingly.

We did Naxx25 as the inaugural raid for the new system and it went very, very well. Looting was smooth and very, very fast. No multiple rounds of calling for rolls, just one box pops up. Everyone puts in their maximum bid and the system resolves winners eBay-style. Whatever doesn’t get bid on comes up for a second round of offspec bidding. I’d go so far as to say it’s flawless thus far.

Only worry I can perceive of is (1) dealing with recruitment when people will come in and find themselves at the bottom of a DKP pile, and (2) dealing with raiders ceasing to attend raids once they are sitting on a fat pile of points. We’ll have to see how those two situations operate when and if they appear.

Now for a funny ironic story:

We have this one raiding healer who I’ve mentioned in the past. She was first mentioned on these pages for disappearing once she snagged most of the loot she wanted from Naxx25, and only recently reappeared in the week or two before Ulduar came out. I don’t think it’s unfair to characterize her attitude as selfish. We’ve had issues finishing Naxx25 in one night this last month, and when told we probably wouldn’t devote a second night to old content, she informed the guild she only runs Naxx for the chance to get a ring from Kel’Thuzad.

Gee, thanks. Screw gearing up folks to help the guild, right?

So on Wednesday we scheduled a Naxx25 so we could fine tune the DKP system and not let it hamper an Ulduar run. Seems reasonable, I thought. Well, like I said, despite it being an exceptionally smooth Naxx run, she bailed out after Maexxna (our first wing), probably assuming we’d stall after two wings like the last few weeks. And a boss later we noticed she was in Obsidian Sanctum.

Okay…

We continued through Naxx, steamrolling everything in our path, and once at the last wing I noticed she was still in OS. They must be working on 3D, I suspected. I /who’d her fiance who is not in our guild, and he was in Naxx as well. She dropped a guild raid to do a PuG achievement run in OS.

And not long after the achievement for 2D popped up in guild chat. No one grats her as far as I can recall.

So the point where irony kicks in is, and I’m sure you’ve seen this coming (and you especially see it coming now that I’ve foreshadowed the shocking twist), we downed KT and the Signet of Manifested Pain dropped.

Sweet revenge! Four different people linked it in guild chat to flaunt it.

More so, we did Ulduar last night and Ignis dropped the Pyrelight Circle (and the Heart of Iron, woooo). Because she skipped out on Naxx, she didn’t have near enough DKP to compete with the other people that rolled on it, and lost that ring as well.

The lesson here, kids? Be loyal to your guild, or irony’s gonna git you.

(Lastly, before I get ambushed by an English major, I know that story wasn’t technically irony… but I’m lazy and it’s so much easier to type that than “unfortunate coincidence” so many times.)

The worm turns on block

Oh, for the halcyon days of TBC when Block was the envy of the non-blocking tank classes (er, well, Druids). Now that stat has been getting the short shrift as of late, with the big hits of Ulduar making block all but useless. As this fact has dawned on more and more tanks, the zeitgeist is clearly turning against block.

Doxa has a great post about the inherent issue with the block mechanic on PRF. Money quote:

In the end, the reason tanks die is spike damage and paladins are eating more of it is because the % of damage mitigated through block value gets smaller and smaller when bosses are hitting harder and harder. 1700 damage mitigated is 1700 damage mitigated whether you’re hit for 2k or 30k.

That sums up the issue perfectly. Block is a bum mechanic that is becoming more and more outdated with every raid instance. And thankfully Ghostcrawler has recognized this. He wrote on the forums that:

Block was a fine stat back when bosses could do Crushing Blows. In their absence, it does feel like it has slipped as a source of mitigation. We (the developers and the community) were worried at the launch of Lich King that block would make warriors the best tanks, paladins second, and everyone else far behind. In retrospect we should have been more focused on the cooldowns and number of hits a tank could take in a row.

Which is the crux of the matter isn’t it? Right now tanks live and die by big hits and how they deal with them. Druids soak damage, DKs blow cooldowns and [had] lots of armor, and Warriors/Paladins… um… block? Clearly, in this brave new world of 20k melees, we are at a disadvantage, and something needs to be done.

Furthermore, Ghostcrawler then indicated in a later thread that block was indeed being looked at by the developers:

We don’t think block is cutting it as a mechanic, but the direction we are likely to take it is probably more of a change than you are considering.

Ominous. In any case, based on the example he gives it looks like he’s leaning towards a situation where non-block tanks would continue to use cooldowns/high HP and armor to avoid/mitigate large damage, while the block tanks would have block help them mitigate more damage on some big hits, and they would eat more of the damage on others. Block rating would go down but block value would go up, making block some sort of bastard child of avoidance and mitigation: mitigation on the RNG.

I can’t say I’m completely a fan, although it seems to be a step in the right direction. In the final analysis, giving up a baseline mitigation of around 1800 damage for occasional mitigation of 8000 damage (or whatever it works out to) would be a fair trade for what we need most: better survivability against the hard hitters of Ulduar and beyond.

WTB another day off

Ah vacation, how I love you. I loathe when you end, but we have fun times while we can.

Speaking of fun times, yesterday myself and Gulliveig (my IRL buddy and guildie who I do not talk about enough on this blog) hosted two guildies from out of state, Ildara and Cendra, who came over to Boston to see us. It was great times, but I think the whole day is a remarkable testament to WoW as a social tool.

I met Ildara and Cendra randomly while listed in the LFG tool for Heroic Steam Vaults way back during TBC. I’ve “known” them for two good years now, and I say known in quote marks because there was the awkward moment yesterday when hands were shaken, hugs exchanged, and “good to meet you”s dispensed.

And yet, it was all sorts of surreal considering aside from never standing within 600 miles of each other, we basically knew each other as well as we could of had they been my next door neighbors and playing WoW.

I think in the end that will be WoW’s legacy for me–not the phat purps I accumulated, or the raid bosses felled, but the friendships I made in the game.

But I digress.

As you may have noticed around Thursday last week I finally caught up to the rest of the WoW-playing public and achieved Champion status with my last faction, which gave me my much-desired Crusader title.

So heroic.

Of course, now I’m out more than 50g a day in dailies, but them’s the breaks.

In a Naxx25 gear run on Thursday night (as I mentioned in my last post) for the lulz I decided to go afk halfway during the Loatheb fight. Mechanics of the fight being what they are, not to mention how insane my threat is, it was pretty easy to just walk away at 50% and go grab a drink or something.

I warned everyone in advance too, and I don’t think anyone believed me. But then at 50% I said in vent “afk guys, I’ll be back in a few” and got a few “wait, WHAT?!”s in reply. Of course, at such a threat lead, it wasn’t hard holding aggro with auto-attacks and Blood Corruption, haha.

Oh, and I saw a fun glitch: a dragon riding a horse. Didn’t know they could do that.

Better Late Than Never Friday 5/22

Aha, so the prodigal feature returns. Actually, truth be told, I forgot to upload a bunch of screenshots last night, so you all will just have to wait to hear epic tales of how I afk’d while tanking Loatheb or other somesuch nonsense. Now now, be brave. I know you’re all troopers. We are tankadins after all. Chin up.

Patronizing goofiness aside, BLTNF is a stupid feature where I put up some random Google searches that brought people to this site and attempt to answer them, or at least elaborate more than the post that brought them here in the first place did.

armor pen tankadin

Armor penetration is terrible for Paladin tanks. Most of our damage is Holy, which bypasses armor by default. ArP only benefits one thing: auto-attack. As such, avoid this stat at all costs, and yes, pass on Gauntlets of the Iron Furnace.

best blue/purple gem paladin tank

Best blue gem is Solid Sky Sapphire. Best purple is Regal Twilight Opal (although there’s something to be said for Shifting Twilight Opal).

best cloak enchant for lvl 80 pally tank

If you’re not crit capped, go with Titanweave. I just picked up Cloak of the Makers, and I was sitting at 552 defense, so I decided to be a little bold and put Greater Agility on it. Basically, Titanweave is .39% avoidance (dodge/parry/miss) and .13% block chance, whereas Greater Agility is .42% avoidance, 44 Armor, and .42% crit. Considering I don’t need the extra defense, the loss of block, gain of avoidance, and gain of armor/crit is a good trade.

best profession combo tankadin

Jewelcrafting + Blacksmithing. Expensive, but when epic gems are out you’ll get the most stamina any profession can give.

bug freya heal herself after adds are down

She’ll continue to heal herself until all adds are killed and her stacks are reduced to 0. Also kill that tree that pops up for time to time, as that’ll heal her if it “ripens”.

cleanse failing fusion punch

I have never heard of cleanse missing. Two possibilities I can imagine: you used it during a GCD so it never applied or you used it prematurely before the dot was on and there was nothing to cleanse.

dodge vs parry gems for tankadins

Dodge. Parry point-for-point gives less avoidance than Dodge. More on that here.

does mob level effect weapon leveling?

Honestly, I can’t find any proof of this, but I think it does. I think you have a much better chance of levelling skill against a mob that you would get experience from (or theoretically would, if not level capped). Just spend a night in Naxx or Uld and if you enter at 399, by the time you leave you should hit 400.

improved blessing of might vs conviction 3.1 prot build

Conviction is much better for tanks. Hopefully there’s a ret pally in your run and 9 times out of 10 they’ll have Imp BoM in their build.

shoulderguards of the solemn watch or t7.5 shoulders

T7.5. More avoidance and gem slots are for teh win.

why don’t paladins stack parry?

See the dodge vs parry question above.

why is my tankadin oom?

I hope that “m” stands for mayonnaise. A paladin tank should never run out of mana as long as you have at least 1 point in Spiritual Attunement, and make sure to keep Divine Plea up as much as possible. Blessing of Sanctuary isn’t as critical as it was before 3.1, but it definitely still helps (especially if you way overgear an instance).

EZ Mode XT-002

So, am I the only one who just found out this week that you can totally trivialize the Deconstructor fight by tanking him between two piles on either the east or west wall?

I read this somewhere (maybe Wowhead?) and proposed it Tuesday, and boy did it work wonders. The two piles its between will never spawn adds, so Scrapbots had so far to go they never made it to the boss. I had plenty of time to grab the large bots before they went after the healers, and the ranged dps had plenty of time to nuke the bomb bots from afar.

Is this intentional on Blizzard’s part? Seems way too easy to not be a bug.

The Boreal Guard buffed

TBG is being buffed to have stats “appropriate to its level.” With these changes, it is now definitively the BiS shield.

Changes to item are:

+70 Armor
+2 Block Value
-14 Strength
+6 Stamina
+2 Defense Rating
+2 Block Rating
+37 Parry Rating

Ulduar 10man BiS+2 list

Per request here is a list of BiS gear found in 10man Ulduar. Some items on this list drop in Ulduar25 (or are crafted by patterns that drop therein), but can be purchased with enough do-re-me. I also included two Naxx25 items that can be purchased with Emblems of Valor, now that those emblems drop in Ulduar10.

Like my 25man list, avoidance has more weight than block, and gem slots have more weight than not. Lastly, as always, comments sought and encouraged!

Head

1. Valorous Aegis Faceguard (N Mimiron)
2. Ironbark Faceguard (N Freya)
3. Thane’s Tainted Greathelm (N 4HM)

Neck

1. Mark of the Unyielding (N Kologarn)
2. Drakescale Collar (Reward: Judgement at the Eye of Eternity)
3. Chained Military Gorget (25 Emblems of Heroism)

Shoulders

1. Valorous Redemption Shoulderguards (60 Emblems of Valor)
2. Valorous Aegis Shoulderguards (N Thorim)
3. Shoulderguards of the Solemn Watch (N Kologarn)

Cloak

1. Platinum Mesh Cloak (25 Emblems of Valor)
2. Saronite Animus Cloak (N General Vezax)
3. Cloak of the Iron Council (N Iron Council)

Chest (of which there is a serious lack in Uld10)

1. Valorous Aegis Breastplate (N Yogg Saron)
2. Heroes’ Redemption Breastplate (N 4HM or 80 Emblems of Heroism)
3. Massive Skeletal Ribcage (N Sapphiron)

Wrist

1. Flamewatch Armguards (N Flame Leviathan)
2. Bracers of Dalaran’s Parapets (60 Emblems of Valor)
3. Minion Bracers (N Naxxramas Trash)

Hands

1. Valorous Aegis Handguards (N Freya)
2. Adamant Handguards (N Ulduar Trash)
3. Gauntlets of the Iron Furnace (N Ignis) [blech]

Waist

1. Indestructible Plate Girdle (Crafted)
2. Stormtempered Girdle (N Razorscale)
3. Waistguard of Living Iron (40 Emblems of Heroism)

Legs

1. Valorous Aegis Legguards (N Hodir)
2. Gilded Steel Legplates (N Flame Leviathan, Hard Mode)
3. Valorous Redemption Legguards (75 Emblems of Valor)

Feet

1. Spiked Deathdealers (Crafted)
2. Greaves of the Iron Army (N Mimiron, Hard Mode)
3. Kyzoc’s Ground Stompers (40 Emblems of Valor)

Weapon

1. Shiver (N Hodir, Hard Mode)
2. Stoneguard (N Kologarn)
3. Legacy of Thunder (N Thorim)

Shield

1. The Boreal Guard (N Hodir, Hard Mode)
2. Shieldwall of the Breaker (N Auriaya)
3. Barricade of Eternity (N Malygos)

Relic

1. Libram of Obstruction (15 Emblems of Heroism)

Rings

1. Signet of the Earthshaker (H Xt-002) [BoE]
2. Signet of Winter (N Hodir)
3. Signet of the Impenetrable Fortress (25 Emblems of Valor)
4. Titanium Earthguard Ring (Crafted)

Trinkets

1. Royal Seal of King Llane (N Yogg Saron)
2. Furnace Stone (N Ignis)
3. Repelling Charge (N Thaddius)
4. Essence of Gossamer (H Hadronox/Azjol-Nerub)

Ulduar tankadin best-in-slot+2 gear list

In this guide I am going to lay out the best in slot gear for prot pallies, as well as the next best two pieces. When choosing what gear I thought was best I gave primary weight to avoidance stats over mitigation stats, so you’re more likely to see dodge/parry gear favored over block rating/value gear. Gem slots gave pieces extra weight as well. Please let me know in the comments what you think!

Head

1. Conqueror’s Aegis Faceguard (H Thorim or 58 Emblems of Conquest)
2. Helm of the Faceless (H General Vezax)
3. Valorous Aegis Faceguard (N Mimiron)

Neck

1. Bronze Pendant of the Vanir (H Freya, Hard Mode)
2. Nexus Champion’s War Beads (Reward: Heroic Judgement at the EoE)
3. Shard of the Crystal Forest (19 Emblems of Conquest)

Shoulders

1. Conqueror’s Aegis Shoulderguards (H Yogg Saron)
2. Shoulderplates of the Deconstructor (H XT-002)
3. Valorous Aegis Shoulderguards (N Thorium)

Cloak

1. Titanskin Cloak (H Mimiron, Hard Mode)
2. Cloak of the Makers (H Auriaya)
3. Platinum Mesh Cloak (25 Emblems of Valor)

Chest

1. Conqueror’s Aegis Breastplate (H Hodir or 58 Emblems of Conquest)
2. Unbreakable Chestguard (H Auriaya)
3. Valorous Aegis Breastplate (N Yogg Saron)

Wrist

1. Mimiron’s Inferno Couplings (H Flame Leviathan)
2. Bracers of the Unholy Knight (H Instructor Razuvious)
3. Flamewatch Armguards (N Flame Leviathan)

Gloves

1. Handguards of Revitalization (H Freya, Hard Mode)
2. Conqueror’s Aegis Handguards (H Mimiron)
3. Gauntlets of the Royal Watch (28 Emblems of Conquest)

Waist

1. Indestructible Plate Girdle (Crafted)
2. Shieldwarder Girdle (28 Emblems of Conquest)
3. Stormtempered Girdle (N Razorscale)

Legs

1. Legplates of the Endless Void (H Algalon, random Hard Mode bosses)
2. Conqueror’s Aegis Legguards (H Freya)
3. Saronite Plated Legguards (H Kologarn)

Feet

1. Spiked Deathdealers (Crafted)
2. Charred Saronite Greaves (H Ignis)
3. Greaves of the Stonewarder (H Trash Drop)

Weapon

1. Sorthalis, Hammer of the Watchers (H XT-002, Hard Mode)
2. Titanguard (H Flame Leviathan)
3. Shiver (N Hodir, Hard Mode)

Shield

1. The Boreal Guard (N Hodir, Hard Mode)
2. Wall of Terror (H Kel-Thuzad)
3. Hero’s Surrender (H Patchwerk)

Relic

1. Libram of the Sacred Shield (H General Vezax)
2. Libram of Obstruction (25 Emblems of Heroism)

Rings

1. Fate’s Clutch (H Thorim, Hard Mode)
2. The Leviathan’s Coil (H Flame Leviathan)
3. Platinum Band of the Aesir (H Auriaya)
4. Signet of the Earthshaker (H XT-002)
5. Signet of Winter (N Hodir)

Trinkets (not including profession trinkets)

1. Heart of Iron (H Ignis)
2. Royal Seal of King Llane (N Yogg Saron)
3. Furnace Stone (N Ignis)
4. The General’s Heart (H General Vezax)

The most epic Auriaya kill ever

I seriously need to make sure to always sign off on posts with a little optimism about the upcoming night’s boss attempts, because that does the trick every time. Our one and only goal last night was to down Auriaya, or at least learn the fight some more, and we got her.

But the story isn’t that we downed her, it was how we did it.

It was our fourth attempt and things were starting off very well. The pull went smoothly, no one dying from pounces, and the adds were properly under control. We had learned how tightly we needed to pack to prevent the Feral Defender from being able to pounce, so that damage was kept to a minimum.

After four kills on the FD, we decided it’s damage was minimal enough we could focus on Auriaya so her health was starting to tick down. 60%… fear, interrupt, recovery, good split on the sonic screech… 44%… repeat cycle… 24%… same deal…

Time was starting to tick down on us. She was at around 5% and we were riding the enrage timer hard. At around 1.3% is was declared in vent that she was as good as dead, no worries. And then she feared, and all the dps scattered. The enrage timer ticks the final few seconds. Everyone reforms on the tank and desperately tries to plunk away at that last remaining health.

Only a few thousand hp remain. And then she enrages.

A 92k Sonic Screech immediately wipes out the entire raid.

And then a hunter’s killshot ticks for 11k and kills her.

The achievement flashes on everyone’s screen and we all erupt in shouts and laughter. What an awesome kill! …a little close for comfort, but nonetheless.

Of the loot the Unbreakable Chestguard dropped, which I snatched up (sorry Demo). It’s a nice direct upgrade from my T7.5 chest. Basically BR/BV to more BR/BV, so no avoidance loss, plus a nice gain in stamina and defense (of which I am now stacking WAY too high).

And then after this heroic victory we plunked away at Hodir for a bit, making some significant headway. But then 10 server rolled around and the EST early risers had to go, so we called.

We’ll get him next week.