My Poor Kid =/

Hey guys just wanted to check in real fast. I don’t think I have signed onto wow and played since last Wed night maybe? My kid (she is only 1) has picked up strep throat + Tonsillitis. The last few months have just been hell as far as picking up coughs, colds, ear infections (which required the ear tube surgery, and now this. What a mess. Anyways she really doesn’t want to eat or sleep because she is feeling so crappy so my time at home is pretty much holding her and trying to get her to get a little bit of sleep or eat a little something. Which of course makes it impossible to raid. I hope to be back in action as far as raiding mid week (the DR said tonsillitis sticks around for about 12 days). Anyways was just checking in with everyone and tossing out a hello since I havn’t been able to post in a while!

Tanking Weapon Toss-Up

Monday night I found myself spamming general chat looking for a healer to do some 2v2with since all my teams seemed to be inactive this week. A pally healer friend of mine helped me out and I was able to get my 10 games in for the week. We went 4-6 which isn’t bad for never PVPing together before. I did respec as always but now I’m thinking with season 4 around the corner I might just go in as prot to get the points until the next season comes around. This would really help me save up some money for once. I have been really broke lately and having a little bit of extra coin couldn’t hurt. After doing my arena games I jumped into a ZA raid to finish off the last two bosses. Hex lord was one shot (which was really nice) and I think we got the last boss in 3 attempts. He dropped the tanking axe which I was lucky enough to pick up. The axe comes with a gem slot, 20 parry, and 12 hit rating compared to the mallet having 3 more stam, 16 defense, and 14 expertise. I’m still back and forth on which I find to be better the axe or the mace (I like the expertise on the mace but I really dig the parry on the axe + the gem slot). I think maybe what decides overall is that the axe graphic looks tight and the mace looks like sh*t on a stick.

I have to raise the gold for another mongoose enchant (just spent like 400-500 gold on the mace and now It’s going to be a situational weapon..grrr) but here is the axe stats.

Last night I had planned to miss the raid because it was my nieces b-day party but instead I found myself at home with a sick baby. I took my kid to the doctor and somehow she picked up tonsillitis and has been running a consistent temp of around 102 =/. I’m hoping her fever breaks today and she can finally get a good night of sleep. Having a sick kid is not fun and really pulls at the old heart strings. Last night while I was getting barfed on the guild was in Hyjal where they killed boss#2! Grats guys, hopefully I’ll get to see this guy next week.

T5 Helm Obtained

As a whole the guild didn’t do much as far as “raiding” goes this week. TK, Gruul, Mag all went untouched, but that was cool with me. Having a slower week every once in a while I think gives people a little bit of a needed break. We did clear SSC though and the big Vag died again. She dropped defender helm token x2 and I was lucky enough to pick one up. I also flew up to the new badge vendor this weekend, stood around for about an hour trying to work my way through all the lag and horde. Once I was able to finally get him targeted I picked up the badge belt which was a pretty nice upgrade for me. I wasn’t able to gem my new items like I would have liked since the AH was bone dry, I guess from everyone buying their own badge upgrades, which is bull sh#t. People should realize I’m the most important person on my server and therefore should leave at least 2 of everything on the auction house should the chance arise I need something. Once I get a little bit of money I’ll go back and re-gem these so that they are utilized to their full potential.

It looks like the guilds next progression target is Kael. I personally would like to see myself moving forward in Hyjal or BT instead but I think that comes from the fact that I just don’t like TK. In fact I think I hate that instance, the trash sucks and makes the whole instance feel “slow” which leads to my ass getting tired. Compare that first hallway in TK (so much waiting on pats) to the first pull in Hyjal (waves of trash mobs on a timer) and that’s my argument for why TK sucks. However as far as bragging rights I think saying you were around for a progression Kael kill is > than a Hyjal boss 2 kill, so I guess eventually it needs to be done. As far as my next upgrade I think I’m going to shoot for the T5 pants so I can get the four piece bonus, although I have heard it really doesn’t proc that much which will be a bummer. Besides getting two new pieces of loot I really don’t have much to write about, so I guess this post will have to be somewhat short. Tonight I hope to wrap up ZA and I also have to get my arena games in. If you find yourself in an arena against me be nice and give me a free win. =)

Vashj Down!

The big Vajayjay is down!

Friday night the guild zoned into SSC with the only goal being to kill lady Vashj, the remaining bosses would be placed on the back burner for now. Normally I hate when farmed bosses are left alive while trying to progress on a new kill because there is always someone who needs an item from a certain boss and 2 of the 3 left alive dropped tier 5 tokens. In this case though it needed to be done, lately when all the bosses but vashj were down most people would log instead of try vashj attempts, which meant we were not getting any hard core attempts at her. Friday night we spent about 3-4 hours learning the fight, I think our best attempt was around 23%, but it got too late and several people had to log. The raid was called and it was posted we would try again on Saturday. I felt that 23% on our second night ever of attempts on her was great. This boss is known to be a brick wall for most guilds and many cannot get past her even after months of trying. Saturday night we had basically the same group of people ready to give her another shot. I was really happy to see it was almost the same people that way no one would really have to “learn” the fight and we could start getting in solid attempts right off the bat. I think it was on our third or fourth attempt that we got her down.

That was an awesome feeling to finally see her die. I think there were a few key actions that really made the difference between the wipes and the boss kill. 1. The guild communication over vent was excellent. People calling out which area the nagas and striders were spawning. This made it possible for our tanks and kiters to pick up the adds before they killed anyone (My job during the vashj fight was to tank the naga's). We also had great communication on the tainted elementals which allowed the “tainted core” people to adjust positioning fairly quickly so the core could be passed around effectively. 2. We had such strong dps individuals that three of the four “ramps/stairs” to vashj were able to be soloed instead of requiring 2 dps each. This freed up three extra dps to be up top to kill down the nagas and striders before they stacked up. *On previous wipes the adds piling up seemed to be our largest problem, 2 seems to be the safe limit on nagas for me to tank, when i get 3 it really puts alot of stress on the healers and i usually end up dying.* 3. On phase three we had the hunters shoot down the sporebats flying over vashj. This seemed to make a really big difference. With the sporebats dead they weren’t dropping the poison all over the raid floor which allowed the tank to move vashj around much easier and leaving the raid much more room to be safe. Vashj dropped 1 defender (that went to the MT, I think I have enough dkp to beat out the other tanks for the next one to drop), 2 champion (if I’m remembering correctly), and a dps leather belt. *Side note: why does Vashj’s snake hair keep moving even after she is dead? If they are still alive you should be able to kill them for extra loot imo* I feel that Vashj is one of the BC milestones and I can now scratch her off my list of things to beat. That’s an awesome accomplishment and what makes it even better is that it was a guild first, I wasn’t just “ran” through the kill with a guild that has been farming her for weeks. Sunday night we went back into SSC to clear out the remaining bosses. After the Fathom-Lord kill I looted my badges and noticed he dropped the tanking necklace which was a nice upgrade for me.

The main tank has the most dkp of anyone so he pretty much can have any item he wants but he passed on it in preference to his badge necklace. Before bidding can start the server crashes……that’s special. I’m pretty sure it’s because “karma” wanted to bite me in the ass since several of my posts lately have revolved around my need to spend dkp and get loot. maybe “Karma” is trying to teach me not to be so selfish. The instance server comes back about an hour later and FLK has despawned along with his loot. The GM holds bidding on the items even though they have despawned so that he can submit a ticket and have the lost loot recovered and sent to the people who win the bids. The bidding starts and I find myself bidding against a feral druid, which i win the necklace for 400dkp. *I had what i found to be a humerous story posted earlier but i took it down so as to not offend anyone.* Since I won the necklace I’m hoping for it to show up in my mailbox any time now, as of Monday evening I still didn’t have it. If I don’t get it maybe that will teach me a lesson to not be such a loot whore, if I get home today and find it in my mailbox.. well then f&ck you “Karma” I got that shit anyways *flips the bird*

Raydz Public Service Announcment #2!

Don’t view Asian CGI chicks, they f*ck with your head and freak you the hell out.

She now haunts my dreams with her freaky dry eyes, torments me with her f*cked up smile, and to top it all off she refuses to give me a happy ending.

Here she is - but you will regret it


On a side note, core dps wasnt on last night so we did HKM,GruuL,Mag instead of Vashj attempts (lame). Again the gruul shield did not drop (also lame). Tonight is ZA, maybe I can snap up a dragon hawk shield.

Crap night turns Golden -- Winterchill Down!

Winterchill down!
Hyjal was easy - Hydross pwnt us - wtf Last night started out even more rocky than normal, I almost immediately logged off. Raid started an hour late. Druid tank was having a hard time on tanking his mobs so people started ragging on him, causing him to quit the raid and guild. Hunter pulled frost phase aggro on Hydross, not sure if it was hunter or tank tps = 2 wipes (I’m nature tank so I’m not to blame!). **Edited 4/12/08 -** Tanks had a hard time keeping adds in line = 2 wipes Every wipe people are blaming each other, pointing fingers, hunter catches tons of hate and leaves the raid. Several people are replaced. Pull five we finally kill him, small amount of dkp awarded because we sucked so much ass. GM calls people out on how much they are sucking and embarrassing themselves, straighten up your act or leave. Plate DPS shoulders drop. A chance to spend some dkp! I toss up an opening bid of 10 dkp (10 dkp out of 2000dkp so it was a next to nothing bid) to see whom im up against. No matter how much I want to spend my dkp im not going to take an item from a fury warrior who could really use the upgrade. 30 seconds pass by, all other warriors have the item so I win. I still made dkp off the boss kill, my goal is to run it down before I transfer/guild implodes, even with that loot my dkp is still going up.
Pulls to lurker go good, lurker is one shot (thank god), mallet drops! Nice tanking upgrade for me over kings defender. /ready to spend 1000+ dkp (in the past this item has not gone cheaper than 800) /bid opens /Raydz bids 100 /Raydz wins /jaw drops DPS plate bracers also on Lurker. /Raydz bids 10 /Raydz wins
My plan to blow out dkp this week so far is not going well. I ended up coming out of the instance with more dkp than I had and I got 3 pieces of loot. Dkp sitting somewhere around 2200 now. The dps pieces are nice, ill use them for grinding. I have mixed feelings about the mallet, I am totally happy about the mallet stats most especially the expertise rating. I’m not very excited though that the graphic looks like a nautilus with a broom stick shoved up his ass. Yeah I get the “lurker” is a water boss but seriously, the graphic is just stupid.
	+		=
After lurker we stood around for fifteen minutes deciding what to do. Some people wanted to finish up farm bosses, some wanted to do Hyjal, some wanted to go to Vashj. I was up for Vashj or Hyjal even though my confidence in the group wasn’t at an all time high I still wanted to do something new. It was decided lets go play in Hyjal, so many people are just burnt on SSC they wanted a night of something different. Everyone catches a port to Shatt, takes the free port to caverns of time (love that port now) and a few minutes later were going over the strat for Rage Winterchill. The real key to this fight is getting through the 8 waves of undead. My main job was to pick up the necromancers and keep them from shooting healers/pally tank. Me, a healer, and too mages are assigned to necro duty. The last several phases I found myself tanking two necro’s , spell reflecting and bashing when possible, and keeping an eye on the other two sheeped necro’s incase they should pop early. The whole plan went off smooth as butter. 8 waves down, everyone alive, tons of npc’s still running around ready to help kill Winterchill. Smooth as butter until Winterchill shows up that is, and one shots a shadow priest, kills our tank in two hits, pops around the raid killing several of our dps (not sure where our healers were). I’m bashing away at the boss trying to get aggro when he finally turns to me and I start tanking him (Hunter MD’s really saved the raid at this point). Even though a druid and I have established aggro at this point I see about half the raid dead and realize there is just no way we can do this. That is until the npcs and Jaina all join in. Winterchill’s life starts falling at a rate that everyone redoubled their efforts. During the fight you have to constantly be aware to get out of the death and decay (red bubbling stuff on the ground), but other than that this boss turned out to be cake. Last night we one shot Rage Winterchill.
Rage INC!
Tanking Rage
Rage Down!
The same group that got owned by Hydross four times earlier in the night turned around and did an awesome job on a boss encounter none of us have ever done before. What turned out to be a hellacious night turned into a great progression raid night. Nothing dropped off trash or Rage that I could use but it was still well worth it to be there for the kill. I think tonight were going to try to finish up our SSC run and turn our sights onto Vashj, hopefully we stay away from the retarded ass wipes and lean more toward the smooth as butter play style. In regards to my previous post of loot thirst, it looks like I have been given a glass, but everyone here knows that im a loot whore so what im really looking for is a keg =P

Dying from Loot Thirst

Picture a man crawling through the desert dying of thirst mumbling “water….water….” over and over to himself. Now take that image, and picture Raydz (my warrior) crawling through serpent shrine mumbling “loot…loot….”. That’s how I have been feeling the last 2-3 weeks, I’m slowly dying from loot thirst. Full clear of SSC/TK/ZA/Gruul/Mag…(besides kael and vashj)..ZERO tanking drops. My dkp keeps piling up with nothing to spend it on. I’m thinking about wadding it up and stuffing it down my pants to pick up the ladies, since that’s about all its good for at this point. I get the feeling that I need to bid high on everything tanking or even plate dps at this point just to insure I get it, since there is a lot of guild drama going on. I commented before having too much dkp is dangerous because a guild can fall apart at any point. I’m sitting on over 2k dkp at this point which compared to almost all the other raiders this is “a lot”, but I’m not hording it on purpose there is just no tanking loot falling. If something happens to make the guild break up before I spend my dkp I may be forced to kill a lot of people IRL and I don’t want to do that. The ZA run this weekend didn’t help with several of the “frayed” raiders any. Last night we were planning on giving the 3rd timer chest a real hard core run. Our dps was massive, heals were spot on, and MT and the OT were doing fine. Even though It was suggested to do eagle first, then bear, then onto dragon everyone decided they should do bear then eagle to pick up the extra 5 mins first just in case anything went wrong. Clear up to bear, bears dead, 21 minutes on the clock to head to eagle. 21 minutes left means things are looking pretty good for a third chest attempt. We mount up, take off to eagle, start clearing up the ramp. That’s when we notice we have no seed on the birds… The lock is back at bear boss…. AFK….. Everyone starts throwing out all these ideas to kick him from the party, kick him from the guild, who to replace him with, do we have enough time to replace him for the second chest, etc. Everyone talking on vent at once and not paying attention ends up on a ramp wipe. The hunter in the raid goes psycho because he really wants the 2nd chest for the axe and gun, and this is the second time in a row the 2nd chest was messed up due to someone leaving after bear. I’m pretty sure he turned into the hulk at his computer. He was screaming on vent, and just generally losing his mind until he quit the raid and logged, I didn’t laugh out loud at the time, but I found the whole thing quite humorous. What made it even more funny is that when the lock returned he was like “Guys I am really sorry I went afk”…*and then gave the rest of the explanation which is what made it funny*. I understand when RL stuff comes up or even emergencies, so when someone goes afk like that most of the time it’s not their fault and nobody has any right to be mad at them. I was totally expecting the guy to say he had some type of RL problem he had to deal with immediately, and I would have been cool with that. Instead we get a “guys I am really sorry I went afk….but lord of the rings came on”. Now I don’t need anything off chest 1, chest 2, boss 1, boss2, or lynx BUT if I had needed chest 2 I would have been really really pissed, but since I didn’t I just laughed my ass off. I’m not sure If the GM is going to give this guy trouble for it, I guess something should be said because he ruined the chest for everyone else because he wanted to watch LOTR? I can’t wait to hear what the hunter has to say when he finds out why we missed chest 2. I can’t wait for the reset on Tuesday, SSC has GOT to drop something for me this week. There is a lot of unrest going on in the guild and I want to dump these dkp points and make sure I snap up some loot before anything happens.