Utgarde Keep Brings Out the Worst in People

I’ve noticed that for some reason if I get a random Utgarde Keep when I do my random heroics, for some reason it seems to end up a struggle, and not because the dungeon is hard. I think people get complacent and think its just UK, I can eff around and do whatever I want and roflstomp this dungeon. Last night was no exception.

The second pull in the dungeon often tanks pull a group of like 8 instead of cautiously pulling one group then the other, because there is one guy that pats across. With the changes to consecration, it has been taking paladin tanks an extra second to get full aggro on these larger groups.

Last night, the pugger in question was a random DK. He ran in immediately and Blood Boiled before the tank had threat on a majority of the mobs. Squishy DPS DK got the attention of all of the mobs, and the following is what happened:

For some reason I didn’t manage to get a screenshot of me telling him he probably shouldn’t Blood Boil before the tank has aggro. What followed was this gem:

Seriously, what kind of DK’s rotation involves running in and Blood Boiling to start before even applying diseases? If he was tanking it would have made some sense if he was trying to rush and get some quick AoE aggro, I do the same thing on my DK tank sometimes (particularly if I have a gogogo in the group). This makes zero sense if you are in a dps role, your blood boil will do more damage if you use it after applying diseases.

We ended up kicking him because he was obviously being a jerk.

The funniest part was after we kicked him, the pally tank chimed in and said, “I had no idea what was going on. I had that guy on ignore from the start.”

As much as I hate getting blamed for things that aren’t my fault and being chewed out when I speak reason, I kinda liked being called a “bitch ass healer.” I know he didn’t mean it as a compliment, but it did kind of tickle me.

Viva – The Bitch Ass Healer

The Best Halls of Stone Ever

Over the weekend I ran quite a few heroics with guild mates, just for the heck of it. One such run consisted of me on Vivacious healing and 2 enhancement shaman guildies. Using the LFD tool we picked up a paladin tank and a mage.

As seems to be common on Viva, we got Halls of Stone. We plugged through the trash easily and when we came up to the intersection to choose which boss to go to the paladin went left to the Brann event.

At this point my guildies and myself questioned him, asking why we are skipping bosses.

The tank replied, “Most people run these dungeons for the points not for the gear.”

Confused, my guildies and I had a brief discussion in vent, basically went along the lines of, “The blues that drop off the side bosses? Is that what he’s talking about? None of us need blues. Does he know that every boss killed gives Justice Points?”

At which point one of us typed just that, “Every boss killed gives Justice Points, so it makes sense to do all of them.”

The tank seemingly conceded and seemed to agree that we’d kill all the bosses after the Brann event.

Skip forward and we have easily completed the event, despite the tank not even attempting to actually tank (my shaman guildies make great tanks!) and are heading back to that fateful intersection once more. I say in vent, “How much you wanna bet he has a change of heart and decides to skip the other bosses?”

No one wanted to bet with me.

The tank, just as I thought, headed down the right path ahead of all of us towards the end boss. Myself and all of the DPS stop at the intersection and have a brief conversation, at which point we determine that the shamans can tank the rest of the instance and tank be damned.

We head left towards the Maiden, easily trouncing through trash. As we get up to the boss the tank joins us and actually decides to do some tanking. I guess he has had another change of heart?

After the Maiden is dead he says, “Ooooo! 16 Justice Points. Pfffft.”

To which I responded, “If you don’t want to do the other bosses then leave.”

Several other snarky comments later and we ended up voting to kick him out.

My shamans tanked the rest of the dungeon quite easily. It was actually kind of exciting to heal. I only lost one of them once because they ran ahead of me out of range.

I guess the whole thing kind of confuses me. Why would he scoff at 16 Justice Points when the end boss gives 24. Doing two extra bosses nets you 32 points. Why would you skip that? I guess it makes sense for a tank though, since they get instant dungeons when they queue. For the rest of us who have to wait 5-20 minutes for a dungeon to pop, it makes no sense to skip bosses.

Lesson learned: Think outside the box when these kind of situations arise. Communicate with your fellow Puggers (admittedly much easier if some of them are your guildies). Don’t let one jerk spoil it for everyone.

 

Ama vs Viva (Disc Priest vs Resto Druid)

Having played around with both of my so-called main characters, I can firmly say at this time that provided things don’t change too much more before expansion, Vivacious will be my main.

She’s opened me up to a whole other world known as DPS. For some reason Shadow spec never rubbed me the right way. I just couldn’t get it down, even with decent gear and being hit capped, I was lucky to do 2k dps. Perhaps Boomkin is just an easier DPS class to play, or maybe I just like being a giant laser chicken more than having a shadowy aura.

I think this may be the best opportunity for me to break into druid healing. There are so many people who seem so dissatisfied with the loss of tree form, and the change to the appearance of the form that is incoming. Some of these people are flat out refusing to druid heal any longer.

Viva giving The Park in Stormwind some lovin'

I am absolutely adoring the new Efflorescence talent. This has to be the most fun AoE heal ever. Especially when it trips your tank up in Pit of Saron and he runs out of it thinking its poison. Hehe!

I’m trying to focus on the positive here, and that is my newfound joy in Druidic goodness. Quite frankly, I’m feeling a lot like Tam right now in regards to Discipline healing (see his posts here and here) , or perhaps even more so. I just can’t bring myself to really stick to the Smite Priest model. I commend Tam for his diligence in truly giving the spec a thorough shake down.

I ran a grand total of 3 heroics with it and immediately decided I can’t split myself that way. I’m a healer. It would be alright maybe if Smite was my go to dps spell in between healing spells, but, well, it just isn’t. Smite feels terribly weak when compared to our DoTs like Devouring Plague, Shadow Word: Pain, and of course Holy Fire. Mmmm… Sexy Holy Fire… ~drool~ Or even Mind Sear with its delicious AoE-ey-ness. Wait. What was I talking about? Oh yeah. Smite.

Maybe my dislike for Smite stems from leveling up through what felt like a billion levels with no damage spell of any real value but Smite, snatching up my mana like its going out of style and leaving me to wand my way through packs of mobs. Admittedly I leveled Holy during BC, so perhaps my viewpoint is a bit skewed.

The bottom line for me, is that using Smite in this way is feeling very forced and I just plain don’t like it. One of the things I’ve always loved about any healing class is that there is much more room for fluidity in rotation. This doesn’t feel fluid to me at all. As Tam said, “it’s far too easy to either get stuck in a smite-frenzy only to look round and discover everybody is dead, or to get so caught up in healing (it’s your job after all) that you forget you could also be smiting a bit on the side.”

As terrified as I am of it, I think I have to seriously give Holy a try. Yep, I’m hopping on that bandwagon. I feel horrible for it, but I just can’t do this. In the meantime I’m spreading some Druid love around Azeroth.

The Last Hurrah of the Tree Druid

With the change in talents imminent with today’s patch, last night Resto druids gathered at the sculpture in the Eventide area of Dalaran for an impromptu party.

Partying like its 1999

I have to admit the change isn’t really that traumatic for me personally, as I am rather new to druidic things. I find it a bit unnerving not looking like myself most of the time, so I rather welcome that tree form will be on a cooldown. Although, I am going to miss doing the twist, and the odd facial expressions particular to the tree. I was actually only just discovering how amusing tree animations could be. Oh, well. If I wasn’t aware of them, then I can’t very well miss them, can I?

Public Service Announcement

Ignore this mage!

As soon as we entered Heroic Nexus this mage hearthed back to Shattrath. We got through the first boss with only the rogue dying to whirlwind, and this was through pulling the entire area due to fears. At which point someone mentioned that the mage wasn’t even with us and that we should kick him. And here is what happened:

Ok… Viva’s Gearscore using the addon is currently right around 4k. Ama’s Gearscore using the addon is right around 5.7k.  So unless this mage is coming from some magic world where Gearscores can be magically up to 10k, I don’t think so.

Secondly, if you have no desire to run an instance, why the hell did you queue and probably wait 20-30 minutes for the dungeon to pop, just to behave like this?

I recognize that this guy has some amazing gear and achievements, but that does not mean he has a right to just trounce all over some fairly fresh 80s and hijack their heroic run. Heroics are easy and they can be done with 2k gearscore, the way we did it when Wrath was brand new.

Everyone in the group was decently geared and was doing decently. The tank was holding aggro, the hunter and rogue were holding their own. There is no reason to make an immediate call like this based purely upon Gearscore. Give people a chance.

It’s unfortunate to see these kind of people running around ruining other people’s mornings. For the most part I feel that RP realms have more nice people per capita than other realms. This guy isn’t it, and he freely admitted that he also role-plays. I don’t know if he was role-playing an asshole or if he really is one, and I don’t care. It’s just not right and I don’t have to put up with it.

So, if you see Indarys from Moonguard, run far, far away.

Vivaciously Yours

When I’m not killing the Lich King on Ama, I’m enjoying myself on my druid. Vivacious is gearing up quickly through 5-mans. She recently got this achievement:

As usual, I prefer healing to dpsing. Although I actually feel very comfortable as a boomkin, which is more than I can say for Ama’s shadow spec.

Viva now has a full four-piece tier 9 set, and it is some very sexy leather. She’s come a long way from being the Worst Dressed Druid in Azeroth.

Viva in Tier 9

I have to admit I much prefer the druid tier gear to the priest tier gear.

And now I present:

Things You Never Want to Hear Your Tank Say

Ding! Druid’s done!

Viva (freshly 80) and her Treant entourage

I did a little marathon of working on Viva this weekend, and to her treants’ joy, she is now level 80, albeit poorly geared. The actual screenshot of her hitting 80 turned out horrible, as I was in the midst of a Skadi fight in regular Utgarde Pinnacle, otherwise I’d be showing it off here. I couldn’t even salvage the bit with the achievement.

I have yet to try a heroic on her, although the dungeon finder says I can. I think I will start out as Boomkin so I’m not hindering the group with my low level healing gear. I’ll still be hindering groups, but it’s easier to carry a DPS than a Healer.

I neglected to collect any +Hit gear while I was leveling up, since I knew my focus would be Resto. Hopefully it won’t be too horrible. Of course, I maybe should still keep on doing regular dungeons.

What do you, dear readers, think? Skip to heroics or keep doing regulars?

Fail Death Knights are Fail (and other fun stuff)

I ran a heroic CoS a few days ago, and it was good fun. The group was great, except for that one DK. You know the one, the one who can’t beat the tank in DPS. But there’s something seriously wrong when they can’t even beat the healer in DPS.

I’ve been working on Viva quite a bit lately. I spent a fair amount of time in Sholazar Basin recently, and I still love it! The quest chains are fabulously fun, plus I get to skin all the critters I kill.

 

Croc Surfing!

There’s nothing better than the petty war between the Frenzyheart and the Oracles and those quest chains. Ama is a Mercenary of Sholazar, and while it was a bit excrutiating towards the end, it was so worth it. I only wish it was a title.

 

Boomkin on a Mammoth?

Where else can you do this, but in Sholazar? It’s just wrong!

And now for something completely different!

This was several PuGs ago in a random Blood Furnace. I’m still not exactly sure why he had to let her out of the house.

For Gnomeregan!

I’m sure everyone is burbling about this right now, but I can’t resist!

The Battle for Gnomeregan has begun! The pre expansion transition is underway!

I went out and did the Gnomer stuff on Vivacious, because it seemed like the thing to do.

Viva isn’t 80 yet, so she couldn’t complete the Gnomer quests, but she had fun with what she could do.

Viva and Totally with their troops

It was awesome leading a pack of gnomes all on mechanostriders to the training grounds at Steelgrill’s Depot.

Where's the girl gnomes at?

My only questions is, I know I brought some girlie gnomes with me for training, but when I go to train with the Lieutenant, all the trainees are male. Where did all the girls go?

They must be back in the kitchen making sammiches.

Mmmm! Sammiches.

Random Misadventures

Three randoms attempted yesterday. Two completed.

Number One

The first was a heroic on Ama. I got H Old Kingdom. I feel like I always get Old Kingdom. But that’s ok. As we enter, the shaman asks if we can do all the bosses because she needs emblems. The tanks says it’s up to the group. As we approach the first boss, I suggest that we compromise and skip the mushroom boss. The shaman bails halfway through the first boss saying that she needs the emblems too much.

Seriously? Now she’s going to have to wait out her half hour deserter debuff before she can get any badges. Isn’t some better than none? Besides, I was just making the suggestion. If she had insisted, I would have backed down. She insisted and then instantly left. Didn’t even give us the chance to change our minds. I only made the suggestion because the mushroom boss is kind of out of the way and annoying.

I wish she had stayed because her replacement was a rather obnoxious GOGOGO mage. We completed this dungeon fairly smoothly anyway and did all but the mushroom boss.

Number Two

The second was a random regular WotLK dungeon on Viva with Totally (new and improved for your enhancement! Hehe!) We get an Utgarde Keep already in progress. The group is just past the first boss. The DK tank starts chain pulling. I’m having enough trouble keeping him alive as it is. We wipe. I’m sorry, but there is no reason to chain pull at level 70. The tank can’t handle it, the DPS can’t handle it, and I can’t handle it as a healer. Maybe that makes me a fail healer, but I can’t do it yet. We ended up bailing on that dungeon. Probably the same reason the previous healer/dps had bailed.

Number Three

The third was another Utgarde Keep with Viva and Totally. We were doing fine with a warrior tank until we got to the dragon room. He tried to bypass the dragons on the side, and managed to pull three dragons on accident. We wiped and the hunter bailed. The tank asked us to give him lead so he could bring an 80 in to run us through. Neither me nor Totally wanted that, so we declined and queued again. Apparently this upset Mr. Tank, because he ran into the dragon room aggroing everything and left the dungeon group.

We queue again, and wait about 15 minutes for a new tank. Meanwhile the Ret Pally tries his hand at tanking, in all ret gear, no BOAs, and often forgetting Righteous Fury. Totally ended up tanking most of that room as best he could. Somehow my Enhance Shaman partner is less squishy than a Ret Pally. Some of us die, and this hilarity ensues.

Level 70 Paladin without his rez spell. /facepalm

Tonnto was a remarkably apt name for him.

Shortly after this we got a real Pally tank in the group and completed the dungeon.

There was much hilarity from Tonnto throughout. He kept yelling about needing Ingvar’s head, until one of us explained that Ingvar was at the end of the dungeon.

At some point he told us we were mean for saying /facepalm when he said less than brilliant things. I dunno, I’ve seen much meaner things. Maybe we weren’t exactly super friendly and helpful, but I wouldn’t say we were mean. If we were mean we would have kicked him.

We had a little chat about our mains, to which Tonnto responded that this was his first character. No surprise there. I’ll give him this much, he did ok damage for his level, despite obviously being a little clueless. I’m guessing he’s just a kid, and I mean no offense in my mocking. It made for an interesting run and a little bit of fodder for my blog. Thank you, Tonnto.