Back on track

Last week was a particularly low point for the guild. We had a bad Tuesday with multiple dumb wipes, and the night ended early when we fled ICC before we could suffer further humiliations. The determination was “well, we don’t have the group for stuff past farm, so nothing left to do.”

Then, to follow it up, Demo announced later that night he was going on extended hiatus and stepping down as guild leader. And, as if that wasn’t enough, Wednesday the raid didn’t even happen due to various attendance issues, my own included.

The question became, was this a TKO for ES?

In the interregnum period between last Tuesday and last night, I did a lot of thinking about what I was going to do to right the ship of state, so to speak. My main priorities were first and foremost to get us back on track for ICC-25 progression and get the latest Thorim, Blood Queen, good n’ dead. Concurrently, I also wanted to expand ES, make it more than just a raiding guild–that is, give people reasons to log on other than ICC on Tues/Wed. Promote some good ol’ fashioned esprit du corps that would make for higher morale in the trenches of Icecrown.

So last night I had a brief meeting, just to inform everyone of my coup and talk about my goals for the guild, not the least of which was a new emphasis on optimism. That is, no more of this “we don’t have the group for this” BS. Nothing kills morale faster than hopelessness, and we weren’t going to play that game anymore. I gave a dopey little pep talk about how we’ve accomplished great things as a guild, how we were the only 25man guild on the server in the first week of Icecrown to down Saurfang in 245 gear (ie, the only guild that killed Saurfang but was not doing ToGC25).

Not to say that’s some huge, earth-shaking achievement, but it proves we can play with the big dogs when we set out mind to something, buckle down, and don’t get bogged down in dumb mistakes.

Anyway, what I basically said was we weren’t living up to our potential, and we were going to fix that.

Post-meeting we shuffled off to ICC and started the run. The plan was bee-lining for the Plague Wing and putting some serious work on Putricide, who at that point we had only killed once, and after some serious effort and two weeks of attempts. Following that, we tried to shift focus to Blood Queen and neglected the good doctor, but that didn’t bear much fruit.

Last week, as I said, the “don’t have the group for this” card was played and we didn’t even try him.

But not this week, things were differently baby! We stormed into Putricide’s lab, wiped spectacularly the first time in one of those “shaking the rust off” wipes where everything that can go wrong, does. The second time we stomped Putri (well, “stomped” maybe isn’t the word, but we got him nonetheless).

I am filled with hope and other warm, squishy emotions. If we could down the sucker with three new people last night (and what could be described as “not having the group”) then, dammit, we can farm him.

After Putri, we took a quick breather and steamed over to VOA to rock Toravon and decompress a bit. Afterwards we jumped Koralon in the off chance that something would drop that one of the newer folks could use. Luckily, the WoW gods smiled on us and Ghrayrynn, a feral druid, scored the 245 tier gloves. So my insistence that we do big smokey had some payoff. Statistically, it was bound to happen.

Back to ICC we went just to clear out the Blood Princes and set up a straight shot for us to Blood Queen the following night. After the pull there was a huge lag spike and it kind of went to hell very fast. A few melee got ‘sploded by the Empowered Vortex, and then on the Keleseth phase, some one managed to kill all of the orbs protecting Slyke (the spriest ranged tank) which then led to him getting squished.

We wiped it and ran back, and while we were setting up for the next attempt I admonished everyone to be careful with Slyke’s balls. This, of course, set off a wave of laughter and a torrent of jokes involving Slyke’s balls. One of the officers whispered me about what a great sign that was–when was the last time we had a good laugh in ICC25? Probably not for a month or two. It seemed a weight came off people’s shoulders with that Putricide kill. Everyone was getting more optimistic.

Now lets parlay that into another great night in ICC. Blood Queen is long overdue for a stomping.

Lastly, I want to congratulate on of my guildees, Ulkjen, for finally getting his epic flying. Ulk isn’t very good with his gold, and for the longest time didn’t even have cold weather flying (until someone loaned him the 1000g). I remember back in Naxx having to go outside to summon him because he couldn’t fly back up from Venomspite.

To help him save, over the last few months he’s been sending me random deposits of 100 to 200 gold and I’ve been keeping them in my pile. Last night he finally hit the magic number and bought the epic training. Like Jgalt said, “if there was ever a ‘SS or it didn’t happen’ moment, this is it.” Grats to him.

10% ICC buff is live

So Hellscream’s Warsong/Strength of The Chynn is now up to 10%. Putting aside any misgivings about the nerf to the instance, etc etc, the bigger question is what this means to us tanks?

With the free health this buff gives (potentially in the neighborhood of a free 5,000 hp), the issue arises of how much health is too much health? And, if we reach this hp plateau, should be start to gem or gear differently?

Wrathy thinks the time is now and proposes gemming beyond straight stamina again. Obviously, because he’s in the 25man hardmodes he’s dealing with a different animal, but nonetheless the lessons trickle down to us normal 10/25 raiders as well.

Does a tank really need to have 60k hp in 10man normal mode? At that point wouldn’t it make more sense to scale back and boost avoidance, to free up some mana for your healers?

Perhaps. I need to do some more thinking about this, and particularly see how the buff to the buff affects tonight’s raid.

Hmm: Taunt hit chance changing?

I’m going to vote for not interesting gameplay.

At the very least, you should be able to reduce your chance to miss a Taunt to zero if you reduce your chance to miss with a weapon to zero. It’s also possible we’ll just let them always hit. (Source)

Taunts going on the melee hit table is a long overdue change. Taunts always hitting seems like unnecessary trivialization. I would prefer the former.

Make it so, GC.

The LK fight doesn’t seem that hard

First of all, the die is cast:

My first act was to kick all the Taurens out of the guild and put out all the basic campfires to prevent future challenges to my rule.

Moving on, last night we went back into ICC for our weekly 10man foray against the Lich King (I say weekly, though this is only the second night of attempts). There was some raid lockout shuffling because most of the people in the group went Wednesday night and cleared up to Sindragosa, so I ditched the raid lockout I was baby sitting and we starting the night two-shotting Sindragosa and then moving on to Arthas.

This just speaks to how disillusioned I seem to be with 25man raiding right now, but the group we had last night was so much fun. There was no impatience to speak of, everyone tried their hardest, no stupid mistakes were ever repeated. Spirits remained high the entire time. It got to the point on the last few attempts where we were just joking around during phase one because we had it down so pat.

But I get ahead of myself. Suffice it to say, 10 > 25.

Offtanking phase one

I’ve learned that tanking the Shambling Horrors in the first phase is something I excel at. I hold it off to the side, picking each up with a Hand of Reckoning and use my stuns every so often during enrages if Cendra (hunter) is otherwise pre-occupied. Picking up the little ghouls isn’t an issue either, saving the shield toss for when they spawn can usually pick them up. If not, I wait til they inevitably target the Ret pally and then Righteous Defense them all back to me.

We did an attempt or two at first with some issues killing off all the Horrors before Remorseless Winter began but afterwards we easily started coasting into phase 1.5 with the Horrors getting picked off by a disease megahit. We also got to the point where we were pushing it past 70% after the second Horror spawned.

Remorseless Winter we then had an attempt or two to streamline. Our biggest issue seemed to be when the phase ended and people would run for the middle but run smack dab into the orb chasing them. We had a few hilarious deaths with people getting blown right off the side of the Citadel.

Phase two issues

At this point I would take over maintanking Arthas because Soul Reaper was kind of a non-issue for me. The attack would hit, and provided I was at full health it would take me into the AD-reduced zone, paring down the 50k hit to a very manageable 47k hit. And, if worse came to worse, I had the extra life proc backing me up. Basically I could ignore the mechanic provided I was fully healed. If a healer got picked up by a Valk that’d be another issue, and then I’d pop a cooldown to be safe.

Defile was another one of those issues that popped up early but was quickly squelched. We got down a system of scattering a bit right before Defile’s cooldown was up, then the targeted person would hastily run out of the affected area. The first time we got to phase two, there was a hilarious Defile wipe where in short order the entire platform was covered in the oleaginous effect because we were so horribly stacked.

The last roadblock that we ended the night on was Valks carrying people off. This is easily fixed those with some discipline on stuns. It looked like everyone was blowing stuns immediately off the bat, which is a terribly dumb idea, if only just because it screws with the diminishing returns on stuns and makes future attempts to slow them down nigh impossible.

Our best attempt we got him to 43%. Next week I’m sure we’ll be cruising in the phase three territory… which honestly doesn’t seem that difficult. No Valks, just Defiles and keeping people alive during Harvests. Considering how amazing the healers are I’m not concerned about that in the slightest. I think next Monday or the Monday after I’ll be rejoicing in a LK kill here.

How to spice up tankadin threat in Cataclysm

So it goes without saying that Paladin threat generation as it stands now is, shall we say, fairly straightforward. Unassuming. Non-pretentious. Some might go so far as to describe it as faceroll.

Indeed, some of us might treat the ease of the Paladin rotation the same way we treat that no-good uncle of ours who’s had one too many run-ins with the local constabulary. Around the family dinner table you might joke about what an idiot he is, but you’ll invariably flip out on a neighbor that’s gossiping about him like some clucking hen. No one makes fun of family except for family, right?

Well, let’s pretend this is the familial dinner table. We need to talk about Uncle Faceroll.

One of the biggest problems with Paladin tanking in general is how automated and streamlined it is. The whole process requires minimal input compared to other classes. Oh sure, we have a wide range of buttons to press, but there’s something version wrong when you can bind that whole rotation to two macros. Our second “cooldown” kicks in automatically, our AP debuff is applied automatically, our attack speed debuff is tacked on to an ability we already use. In short, our tanking style requires significantly less input than other classes.

Take warriors (please! har har har) for example. They have a “counterattack” ability, a proc that can change the priority of their rotation, an “on next swing” attack, and have to actively keep up both debuffs. Druids have a dot they have to stack and actively keep up on a boss and an on-next-swing, among other things. DKs have two diseases they need to keep up on a target at all times and a counterattack. Conversely, we have a straight rotation, as immutable and immovable as a glacier.

Here’s what I think should change:

1. Change Holy Vengeance to a separate ability that applies the dot, independent of what Seal you have up. The attack applying the dot will be low threat, and having five stacks will be mandatory to maintaining proper threat on a boss. Because the ability applying a stack will be so low threat, you will be discouraged from allowing clipping your stacks. Seal of Vengeance can still do damage as a proc based on how many stacks you have up.

2. Redoubt is undoubtedly changing in Cataclysm with the shuffle being given to block. Perhaps retool the talent to be a clone of Sword and Board. When you block an attack you have a x% change to proc a free, immediate Shield of Righteousness.

3. Holy Shield is also probably getting an overhaul as well, and with much less consistent blocking probably would be as tps-heavy as it is right now. As such, retool the ability so that when you dodge/parry/miss an attack, you can hit Holy Shield and you’ll immediately respond with a “holy bitch slap with my shield” ala Revenge or Rune Strike. This might be a tad redundant with ShoR already existing, so maybe just make a new counterattack ability for Paladins.

Yes, I’m advocating homogeneity

I know that’s such a dirty word in the community, but honestly it’s the only way I can see to fix this impasse. The 4 kinds of attacks tanks in this game have (generally) are instant, on next swing, counterattack, and a dot application. Certain tanks have abilities that fall under those categories, or maybe dance on the border between them.

All our attacks are instant, with one leaving a puddle of dots on the floor, and one adding a dot to our attacks… automatically.

This is what heterogeneity has gotten us? We’re the “faceroll” tank class, for good or ill, and if that’s our special flavor, I’d rather them make us a little more vanilla.

Trading avoidance for EH

Just wanted to point out this awesome post over at Maintankadin for any aspiring tanks or, hell, any folks trying to determine when to sacrifice avoidance for more effective health.

Go to this post and scroll down a little to the descriptions of the tank levels, find yourself and your recommended number. Then, scroll down a little bit more to where it says “How to stack stamina” and gem or enchant down the line as your tank level would recommend.

Awesome guide based on some rock-solid math from Theck and Meloree. I was pleasantly surprised to find I’m doing all but the last three, and strongly considering the third from the bottom: replacing the Argent Crusade head enchant with the Engineering one.

If you’re debating the value of one gem/enchant over another through the lens of EH, this is a great tool to help you along the right path.

A new chapter begins

The night began innocuously enough, as most patch nights do, with everyone unable to log in or getting repeatedly disconnected. Invites went out, we raided ICC, etc. The usual.

After we called it a night I lingered in vent and the game, cutting gems for some folks before I logged. Ildara then mentions “did you see the forums?”

I look and there’s a post by Demo saying he was quitting the game, or at least going on extended hiatus. I immediately report this in vent and one of the people there asked who the new guild leader would be. “I guess me,” I sighed.

And just like that I was the new guild leader of Enveloping Shadows.

To be fair, it’s been like this for a while. Demo’s interest has been nothing but waning since January. I’ve been the de facto guild leader for at least two months now.

And to think a year and two months ago I first joined this guild and could barely get a raid spot. Now I’m the goddamn guild master.

There are no hard feelings between us. As difficult as it is to see him go, we always said you gotta do what you gotta do. If you’re burning out there’s no reason to hang around and become ever more miserable.

My immediate goals now are to arrest the morale decline of the past couple of weeks and get us progressing in ICC-25 again. I have no idea how we’re going to do that. I basically need to force a culture shift, which seems near impossible. I’m up for the challenge though.

Toynbee said that “countries die from suicide, not from murder.” I think the same is true for guilds. Leaders lose interest or their morale collapses. This trickles down and people stop trying, and then wipe to stupid things. Issues exacerbate issues until there is a critical mass of discontent.

I won’t let that happen. I can fix this.

If your time to you is worth savin’
Then you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’.

3.3.3 Paladin changes

Paladin

• …

No news is good news!

Actually, about the only “big news” for our class this patch is the tooltip for Sacred Duty was changed to acknowledge the 4% stamina nerf.

I’ll take a simple tooltip change over AOE nerfs any day of the week.

Back in the seat

Muscle memory is a huge convenience. After a week spent in the icy tundra of Orlando (I brought a cold snap down with me, sorry Floridians), I came back from the conference this weekend and was bamboozled into an ICC-10 run last night. Still sitting on a raid lockout I had the foresight to extend before leaving for my work trip, I reactivated it and we hopped in right to Sindragosa.

And despite having not tanked in a week and being incredibly rusty feeling, my fingers apparently were able to jump right back into the flow and managed to do the thinking for me. I couldn’t for the life of me remember what key Holy Shield was mapped to, but when the point came in 969 to use it my middle finger instinctively shot up and pushed 2 down. I felt like Doc Ock with his sentient mechanical tentacles.

I was just, as a lark, reading the wikipedia article on muscle memory and it mentioned that you need to repeat an action 740 times for your brain/muscles to “memorize” it. I have no idea if that’s true, but think about how many times I use Holy Shield over the course of a raid. According to this log it was almost 200 times in one raid.

Sorry, stupid digression–I just found the whole concept fascinating. Some people use muscle memory to make repair cars better, some for surgical procedures, I use it to lower my reaction time while tanking.

Anyhoo, Sunday night. Raid. Sindragosa.

We did a few attempts on the crazy harpy (BETRAAAAAAAAYS YOU) each time doing fantastic and then having some issues with phase 3. After a chunk of attempts people got the hang of getting away when targetted for ice blocking, breaking people in their group out, etc. The second to last attempt we got her to 5% or so, then the last one it was a photo finish, killing her with a few people dead and two people blocked, along with the boss nearly almost enraged. It got to the point where people shouted out “ignore the blocks! Kill the boss!”

So we did and then she dropped. It was messy, but the way attempts were trending we were probably going to kill her cleanly the next time. I’ll take a sooner messy kill over a perfect kill ten minutes later. Time is always a luxury.

Another digression: let’s talk about raid leading philosophy for a second. What did in the 5% attempt was two people got extra-blocked (ie, stood too close to the targeted person) and the attempt fell apart. On the run back I named names and stressed paying attention not just to where you are when targeted but also where others are when they are targeted.

I was then (jokingly, though) accused of bitchery. In your raids, do people get called out when the make mistakes? I know personally I usually let people chastise themselves in private, but lately I’m not so sure that’s effective. I feel a dignified public shaming would better reinforce “oh hey, standing next to this guy is a bad idea” the next time around.

Whenever I screw something up my first response is to apologize in vent and explain how I screwed up. I’m just extending that courtesy to everyone else now, haha.

But, again, I digress. After Sindra was downed we excitedly bounded over to the Upper Spire and then up the teleporter to the Frozen Throne. We all posed for pictures with Arthas (hence my pic above) and then kind of dawdled about how we were going to deal with the fight. It was a Sunday night and already kind of late, and as much as I’d like to take a 15 minute break to watch the video, we didn’t have the time for that.

I alt-tabbed and browsed stratfu’s strategy a bit (I know, for shame, not being prepared!) but I got lost in the mountains of descriptions and all the cascading diagrams. Ironically (maybe) for someone who writes a blog and guides about fights sometimes, but I for the life of me, cannot learn a fight by reading a description. Words just blend together and I get bored of what I’m reading. I’m a much more visual learner, or at least I need to wipe a few times for something to “click”.

Anyway, we decided to wing it. Yes, wing Arthas. We had about 20 minutes, we weren’t going to kill him that night, might as well have some fun.

We had some basic understanding of how Phase 1 worked based on how much we read before giving up and after the second try we were basically getting through it pretty easily, once positioning was worked out.

The Remorseless Winter phase went a little oddly with us dying in new and exciting ways each time we tried it. The first time we weren’t expecting the floor to crumble when it did (I blame Gandy’s saronite bombs) and a few of us tumbled to our deaths. Another time one of the ice clouds burst too close to a few of us and we got blown off the side of the map.

Like I said, we didn’t have a shot in hell of dropping Arthas in our short time window. I’m rolling over the lockout to next weekend and we’ll get a full night on the sucker then. At this point I doubt many people care about the 251 gear or the easy badges, we want our Kingslayer titles.

On cooldowns

In a thread on the tanking forums, Blizz is seeking opinions about tanking cooldowns: their durations, their effects, etc.

I can’t post on the forum from my phone so I offer my opinion, abbreviated, in this space.

For one, cooldowns shouldn’t be down for more than three minutes. Ideally we should be able to use them at least twice over the course of a fight. Moreover, glyphs reducing durations is a terrible idea. Glyph should add functionality or diversify the ability, never tinker with the length of time the cooldown is up or down.

Cooldowns also, I feel, need to move away from being just “reduce damage by x%”. That’s boring at best. Our cooldowns should have some flare to them. Give us a bevy of abilities that affect different types of damage–ie, physical or magical. For example one ability could give you temporary resistance bonuses to the last magic school you took damage from, another could boost your armor value.

Cooldown usage should require most thought than a binary “do I need an oh-shit button? y/n”.

And fer chrissakes, no more automatic cooldowns. I want buttons to push dammit.