Archive for the ‘Guilds’ Category

I logged in tonight to find a group of my guildies half way through Heroic Nexus, and they were short a healer. Guess who got another trial by fire? lol

I slapped on my holy gear and flew on down. I entered the dungeon to find everyone way, way in the back, past some mobs. Great. One of them killed me before I could even meet up with the group. After I rezzed and met up with everyone, I faced my biggest challenge: massive lag. I had such latency issues that I’d click a spell and have to wait a few seconds before it’d cast. That could mean life or death for the whole party as a healer. We killed our first boss (their third overall; remember, I joined late), Ormorok the Tree-Shaper, with little fanfare. I got silenced a few times, but we lived. On to the final boss, Keristrasza!

This was a pain, because the boss kept using a damage over time frost spell that made it hard to keep everyone alive. Our first attempt failed when our tank died (damn lag), letting the boss loose. Try number two failed when I died from that DOT spell. Third time, as they say, was the charm. We learned to move to shake the frost spell, so that was less of an issue. Our tank got killed again, but the rest of us dropped the dragon. We rezzed the tank, doled out the loot and some ‘gratz,’ and headed back to civilization to regroup and repair. As usual, no loot for me, but I got some more intensive healing training. Some day I may be able to be a regular healer for the guild.

I still prefer being DPS, though.

I was given a second chance this morning, and I kinda, sorta took advantage of it. The guildie who took me to Violet Hold to heal last time invited me back to do it again. Some people are gluttons for punishment, I guess. Anyway, I’d upped my spell power by almost 300 points and installed Healbot since then, so I was ready. We did ok, and again cleared it in one try, but again there was allot of dying. I died this time, too. Twice. No one died in the fight with Cyanigosa this time, though. She was toast in no time. All in all it was an experience, and experience is what I need right now, as much as gear. We also got A Void Dance, but that required my guildie who invited me all but soloing Zuramat after we all died.

Cyanigosa is dead again, but this time not without some drama. One of my guild’s leaders and I went with three others into Heroic Violet Hold tonight. It was me (a ret pally), my guildie (a death knight tank), another death knight, another ret paladin, and a n00b. I mean, a restoration shaman. She wasn’t the best healer though, to be honest. She had a gear score of almost 2k points less then the rest of us, and she wasn’t too experienced. So, it was not a huge surprise when we all died (it was sort of a surprise that we got to Cyanigosa before wiping, but that’s neither here nor there). When I went to ghost out, my game crashed. It took me awhile to get back in, and when I did another guildie had taken my place. I didn’t begrudge them one bit for replacing me. In fact, I was hoping that they weren’t sitting around waiting on me. However, once back (and after the group wiped again), I was re-instated to the group, much the the chagrin of the shaman. Why, I don’t know. I guess she just liked the my other guildie better (they were both girls). We promptly died again when the healer went ahead of us and got killed.

It was clear what our weak link was, but how to fix it? My guildie had a plan: we told the shaman we were breaking the run off, at which point she left. We promptly inserted a druid healer with a gear score 700 points higher then mine. Yes! The rest of the run was rather uneventful, aside from some joking about the shaman. We quickly cleared the dungeon and I got a total of 5 emblems of heroism out of it (two the first time, and three when we tried again). I now have enough to buy a libram at the EoH vendor, but I’m not enamored with the one available. It’s buff to my Seal of Command would be great, if I actually used that spell. As it is, I don’t, and probably won’t before patch 3.2 removes Seal of the Martyr.

What I find interesting is that we died over and over with this shaman, but I healed my group yesterday through in one try. People died, yes, but we didn’t ever wipe. I guess I’m not too sucky of a healer.

BTW, I did remember grab the dragon’s head this time. I also didn’t get any loot. Again. WoW has it out for me for mocking dungeons.

Anyone who’s been reading this blog has probably noticed a severe dichotomy in my posts the last couple of days. Four days ago, I ripped raiding and instances. Three days ago I went to my first Heroic dungeon with my guild. Two days ago I joined them in my first 10-man raid. What’s happened? I’ll elaborate.

My guild has been asking me for a while to join them for a while now. I enjoy going with them but I have this huge fear of letting everyone down. I also still hate hardcore raiders with a passion. The ‘do everything the hard way, up hill, both ways’ thought process irks me. It finally dawned on me this morning, though, that I’m kinda just being drug along by my guild. I don’t feel I’m truly pulling my own weight here. I think this leaves me with two options: stop running instances with the guild, or put in double time so I can hold my own. For now, I’m opting for the latter. We’ll see how it goes.

My guild asked for all eligible level 80s to help on 10-man Obsidian Sanctum, and since I qualified, I tagged along. My first trick was figuring out where OS was. Once I did that, we ran through two backup healers before opting for another DPS and my guild leader respeccing his alt for healing.

We did ok clearing the western half of the dungeon, but the start of the eastern half was shaky.  We wiped on trash mobs when they ganged up on the main tank who promptly died, allowing the mobs to run amok amongst the rest of us. After that, we fought Vesperon, and I was part of the contingent chosen to go into the portals with the off-tank, along with the rest of the DPS and one of our healers. That fight was no big deal. Sartharion, though… that was a beast. I was warned to avoid the lava waves, to which I said, “what lava waves?” After it was explained, my guild leader on his restoration druid whispered to me to help with the healing to keep the tank alive. So, I was to pour on the damage and help keep the tank alive? *gulp*

As you can see, it all worked out. No one died, but I did get hit by one of the lava waves I was warned about. I was dying in a hurry, but Lay on Hands and Cleanse saved my hide. I then turned on my Fire Resistance Aura to help everyone cope. I kept one eye on everyone’s health bars and kept Sacred Shield on the main tank, firing off a Flash of Light when necessary. I got a few more Emblems of Heroism, but no loot. Oh well, maybe next time.

One last note: compared to my Heroic Violet Hold, I did much better, DPS-wise, ranking 2nd or 3rd, depending on whose recount you went by. My DPS in H VH was almost under 1k, but I nearly topped 2k in OS. Nice.

My fears were misplaced. My guild’s second in command and another high ranking officer invited me along to do the Leeeeeeeeeeeroy! achievement at Blackrock Spire. Myself and the other newcomers were a little lost as to a strategy to achieve this (we just hacked away at the whelps like crazy), but with my senior guild members there we got it done. Here’s a pic of our success.

Pretty cool shot, huh? I announced that I was hearthing back to Dalaran for a pint, and invited whoever wanted to come with me. Both my senior guildies joined me and we drank to our success.

However…

We weren’t there long when a mass mammoth migration took place in Dalaran. See for yourself:

That’s just a handful of the mammoths parading around Dalaran. And of all things, one of my senior guildies – the second-in-command – joined in (you can see him here; he’s the gnome with the green hair)! This was one of those surreal MMO moments that reminds you that you’re playing with other humans. It was just too weird to script.

Now, I may be reading too much in to this, but ever since we ran Violet Hold earlier today, neither of my guild leaders has spoken to me. No welcome, no ‘how are you,’ nothing. It’s a little disconcerting, especially with how poor I did in the dungeon. Like I said, I may be reading too much in to this. Then again… maybe not. If I end up demoted or /gkicked tomorrow, I’ll know why.

My guild leader and the second in command asked me to come with them to Heroic Violet Hold, so I complied. In the end, we slayed Cynigasa in one try and I got my first three Emblems of Heroism, a couple stone keeper shards, and a frozen orb. Sweet! My DPS sucked, but we won regardless. Ichoron was a pain, what with little elementals running to his aid constantly. They didn’t come when I taunted them, either, which was a pain. Moragg was the other random boss, but he was nothing special. It was a fun time.

Edited for Clarification and to add Links

Well, I’ve got interesting news to report this time. I was doing some wheeling and dealing in Darnassus when a couple guildies messaged me to join them for the last boss of the Oculus. They’d killed everyone up to Ley-Guardian Eregos, where one of their team left. They needed a DPS, and I fit the bill. I asked if I needed to know anything going in and they gave me a quick rundown: fly my drake up to the boss and apply as much damage as humanly possible.  Chunkeyman, ßloodraven, Sanctifier and I were among the representatives of our guild in this five-man party. I did ultimately die in the climatic battle, but no matter, the boss was slain and the rewards were doled out. I didn’t get anything out of it because nothing was an improvement on my current gear (Helm of the Ley-Guardian vs. my Charged Titanium Specs and Malygo’s Favor vs. my Claymore of the Prophet). My big reward? I was able to be helpful to the guild, and that’s better then any gear in the game, to me. Maybe I’ll tag along next time they run an instance, and see if I can make it through without being a dead weight. lol

I was asked today to help a level 25 guildie named Dameryus (the one we tried to get the Jenkins title for from that earlier post) do the paladin’s weapon quest, Test of Righteousness (which sounds like a test to see if you’re awesome or not, or maybe the coolest test ever, but it’s neither of those). The lvl. 17 hunter Hazo and his pet cat, Cat, tagged along. We first went and did Bailor’s Ore Shipment in Loch Modan for the first part (we started in Dun Morogh), and killed Chok’sul for good measure.  On our way to the Silverpine Forest and therefore Shadowfang Keep, we grabbed a few flightpoints and killed a few baddies, but I kept us back as we nearly ran afoul of the undead courier making his rounds in Hilsbrad Foothills with his body guards. They’re not problem for me anymore (note I said, anymore; they’ve killed me in the past), but I had two charges with me. Once past them, I led us past the turn to Shadowfang Keep… so we had to run back. Once there, we found out that it was closed. No, really. We got a message saying that there were too many instances running and we were unable to enter. Finally it let us in, and about a minute or so in, Hazo said he had to go, logging off in the dungeon. Not my idea of smart, but hey, to each his own. We got the part and promptly ran the dungeon just for kicks. We zipped back to Stormwind to regroup when dinner came calling for me, so I logged off for an hour or so.

When I logged back on, Dameryus was in the Deadmines, where the third piece of the puzzle was. I asked if he’d found someone else, and he said no, and that he needed help. I went over and was added to a group with him and two other paladins. One was ok, but the other was a pain in the ass. Rholland, was his name, and he wanted everything his way. No killing things for him, no ‘running’ of the dungeon (it had to be completed ‘properly’), he wanted all the treasure, all the cloth and everything that dropped was his to take (so he told us). He’s lucky I can’t kill Alliance players, ‘cuz I would have killed him. I was told not to kill things too quickly, so I just stayed back and healed. While in the Mast Room, the other non-jerk pally disappeared. Did he log off? No idea. Anyway, about at the entrance of the final section leading to the boat’s hold, I was told to ‘run it as fast as I could,’ and to kill whatever I wanted. That made the last part of the dungeon about 10x faster then the first part. However, Glory Hound wanted to kill Van Cleefe. So, I was back to healing.

On our way out, Rholland stopped us and demanded any cloth we had. Dameryus said he had left it on the bodies for him because he was out of bag space. He turned to me and I told him, “you think I actually looted anything?” He wasn’t too convinced, but left.

Dameryus had to get of for a while, so we called it off for the night. Tomorrow we’re supposed to finish the quest, which will take us to Ashenvale.

Let this pic be a warning though; if you’re on the US server Cairne, look out for Rholland. The dude is a major pain in the ass. Dude was level 28 and talked down to me. I could have one-shotted his ass! Goes to show that how cocky some people can be.

Not smart, just cocky.