Wednesday 30 September 2015

Lazy Mage...

FOTM-roll, the mage, has been sat at 100 for some time now.

All those plans to see how he fared versus my shaman have fallen by the wayside.
I got him raid-ready, 690ilvl, with upgraded Apexis gear, Kazzak and some crafting but ,no matter how much I would like to be doing extra raids with him, I just don't have the time.

So he just flies (because he can) around his garrison doing professions stuff and sending boats/followers out to continue his legendary questline.
Lazy bugger!

There are a few options for him...

1.  Move him into my Shaman's guild and join their alt night.
A nice idea but I never turn up to the alt night anyway, it's on a Friday evening, he would just be flying around his garrison in a different guild.

2.  Raid with the guild he is in.
Another nice idea, they are progressing through the later stages of normal modes so he is fairly close to them in gear and my experience on the Shaman should be able to bridge that gap.
Unfortunately, the first two raid nights clash with my Shaman's raid nights and the third is their progress night when I'm sure they would prefer me to bring my actual Shaman.

3.  Pug.
I hate pugging

4.  Fly around his garrison for a while then level another char...
Yep, this is what I'm doing.  Levelling 2 chars actually.
Priest is at 98 and Warrior is at 40 (new record!) 
(Warrior is stuck now though, I don't like the Thousand Needles and WPL/EPL are still a bit too fresh from the Mage.)

So the Mage joins the list... Rogue, Prot Pala (haha), Hunter... chars I have great raid plans for before realising (again) that I don't have time for more raiding.

Expect a 'Lazy Priest' post in a few days...

Tuesday 29 September 2015

Crazy Times...

Work has been mental recently and the blog (and my sleep) seems to be the first thing to suffer. 
I unashamedly write all my blog posts at work during a combination of downtime and coffee breaks so, when that downtime disappears, the posts dry up (again).

I need some way to find those few minutes each day or two to keep the posts flowing as, once I get home, I am much more interested in playing the game than writing about it.  Suggestions anyone?

Anyway, lame apologies for not posting aside, what's been going on?

Raiding moves slowly onwards with Archimonde Heroic now firmly in our sights. 

Our first full progress night on him was excellent!  Steady improvement made all through the night, culminating in our final attempt wiping at 7%

We've started killing Archi on normal as a guild each reset for ring upgrades so most people knew the tactics, nothing much is different apart from the usual 'everything hurts more'.

Phase 1 was going fairly smoothly bar the occasional lack of spreading sending half the ranged team into the air but that was soon sorted out.

Phase 2 was a little trickier for a couple of reasons...
First, we kept losing a tank when a Deathcaller coincided with Allure of Flames - Our RL Blood DK was getting very annoyed, claiming that people weren't doing enough damage to the Deathcaller.
I thought the issue was more to do with the ranged all moving for Allure and not being able to dps but she must have been right because the problem just seemed to disappear.

Every time you introduce a mechanic that targets a random player, it takes a little time for the whole team to have experienced it enough times to know exactly what to do (Amber-Shaper anyone?).
And this was our second issue, Wrought Chaos. 

You would think that stacking behind the boss and occasionally moving a few yards further back would be fairly straight-forward but some people seem to lose their heads completely! 
There would be people running all over the room in all directions as if they had to get as far away from it as possible. 
Maybe they thought they had to break it like the chains or something?

I don't know but it did end up with a few comedy moments of people seemingly chasing each other round the boss (with the Benny Hill theme tune playing in my head)

As the night went on we improved at those two phases and began to reach phase 3 in
fairly decent shape with all raiders alive.

Phase 3 seems to be the first point the fight is noticeably more difficult than normal, with HP-bars spiking very low at times and each mistake resulting in a death or wipe.

A couple of attempts to get the Nether groups sorted (and properly killing the Void Star), a couple more to push Infernals at the right time and to remind everyone to kill them. 

We were getting there slowly but it felt frantic at times, never truly under control as we pushed into the Infernals and then the closing moments of the fight.

As much as we were improving, time finally caught up with us and we called an end to our raid.

There was to be no kill this night but, overall, there was an almost tangible feeling of great progress being made and we will attack him next week full of confidence.

Archimonde, your days are numbered!

Thursday 10 September 2015

Moving Day...

Moving day 
The penultimate day of a four-day tournament, so called because it is the day where competitors try to set themselves up for the final push on the final day.



Most major golf tournaments are played over 4 days and 'Moving Day' is generally thought to be when the people who are going to have a realistic chance of winning the tournament put themselves in the leading groups.

Raiding is exactly the same.

Honest.

Moving Day is what will mostly determine what progress, if any, is made during the week.

The first two days in golf are about making the cut, just staying in the running and making sure you are around for the weekend.

This is our farm night.

We've got these bosses sorted, it doesn't need our full concentration and we don't need to take risks for those extra few dps.  All that matters is that we kill them.

For my raid group, this covers Hellfire Assault through to Iskar.  A wipe only happens if someone does something monumentally stupid or half the team switches off completely.

Sometimes we can take a bit extra from them... a piece of loot to help us further down the line, or a faster kill to give us a headstart in the next round, but these are just a bonus.
It's just about being in the game at this point.

Next is those bosses in the middle. 
You know the ones, you've killed them a couple of times but they still need full concentration or wipes can quickly happen.

How these bosses are treated is what determines your chances of progress for that week!

We've all seen it happen, a boss that you have killed a couple of times now gives you problems and you wonder why.
Everyone has killed these bosses before.
Everyone knows the tactics.

These aren't farm bosses though, it only takes a couple of people that aren't fully-focused to bring down the team.
Leaving that interrupt for someone else.
Letting others switch to that add.
Blindly AoE-healing instead of smart healing (Spam Chain Heal ftw!)

Treat them like the farm bosses and things quickly fall apart, wipes stack up and morale drops. 
The night ends with only two or three bosses down and a mountain to climb on 'Progress night'

On the other hand...

If your whole team can treat these like progress bosses, it all changes!

People want to do the interrupts, tank-healing, switching to adds, moving from fire, or whatever is known to be important for getting the kill. 

The fights suddenly become smoother... the focus you had during progress combined with extra gear picked up since the last kill make everything die that little bit faster or with a touch less healing needed.

What could be scraping past two bosses becomes a march towards progress bosses, as the fights are over in one or two attempts rather than six or seven.

The team is flying and starts to reach the progress boss with half an hour of raiding to spare, giving you time to have a look at the tactics and positioning.

You are in perfect position for the big push for progress!
The championship is in sight and, don't get me wrong, the performance still needs to be right on the night.
But the team is there and ready for the challenge because you got it right on...

Moving Day.

Wednesday 9 September 2015

A Worthwhile Pug...?

Does anyone actually like pugging?

I hate it!

I don't know whether it's the ridiculous requirements to even get in, the toxic attitude of people in the groups, or just a lack of confidence around strangers, but I avoid pugging as much as possible.

To make things worse I've somehow missed Archimonde and don't have the kill on any difficulty...
I was away when the patch dropped so missed early attempts
I switched guilds and they focused on Heroic progression, killing Archimonde normal on an off-night I couldn't attend.
I switched guilds again before killing Archi HC and my current guild hasn't made it that far yet (although we are closing in fast, now 12/13HC).

So I was sat at 710ilvl with 12/13HC under my belt but unable to get into a fresh normal pug because I haven't killed Archimonde!

Extremely frustrating.

I don't expect random people to take my word for knowing the tactics but you can safely bet that most of these runs aren't getting as far as Archi anyway.

I spent some time looking through the Group Finder for a run that wasn't asking for the achievement and eventually found one: Fresh run Achi preferred.  I'm in!

"No, I don't have the achi but I have plenty of XP"
"Ok, we'll give you a go"

Mighty kind of you.

I then proceeded to top the dps on all the fights we did, anything from 20% to 50% higher than 2nd place.

RAGE!!!
To be fair to pugs it began fairly smoothly once we were in there. 

There was some random raging from a DK who wanted to go to Gorefiend before Council and Kilrogg, not sure why.  Very strange.

We did wipe on Kilrogg as people got a little ragged and a few extra bloods appeared.  Still almost got him though, wipe at 450k HP.
Bit of raging at a healer who missed the portal twice, they left, we brought in another healer and we killed it.

Next wipes, and the end of the run for me, came on Xhul'horac.
It was all quite messy on both attempts we had and the finger-pointing began in earnest.

Some people weren't switching to adds,
Some were dropping fire wherever they felt like it,
Some were not moving from fire
Most people were doing ok though and I thought we would probably kill it on the next attempt.

But the finger-pointing hadn't finished, lots of recounts and skada tables were linked and somehow the blame landed squarely on... the healers!

Even now I have no idea why the healers were blamed but, suddenly, it was like a witch-hunt!

The attacks on the healers commenced, covering everything from talent choices to transmog, until all 4 of them left the raid.

There were a couple of voices supporting the healers (me and a mage who was also doing the fight properly) but we were drowned out by the vitriol of the angry mob.

I took this as my cue to leave too.

My conclusion is that pugs are generally fair-weather runs. 
While the sun is shining, everyone is happy.  But, as the clouds close in and those first drops of rain start to fall, it's every person, dwarf and spacegoat for themselves as they run for cover.

Was it worthwhile?
Well, I wasn't expecting to reach Archimonde so the only loot I needed was from Gorefiend, tier legs. 
And they dropped!
I now have my 4-set

If the only function of pugging is to get some loot rather than the experience itself then it was definitely worthwhile.

I won't be rushing to join the next pug though.  And I won't be pugging anything on my alts until I have killed Archimonde in some way.

Loot just doesn't seem worth the hassle.

Thursday 3 September 2015

Socrethar the Eternal...ly Frustrating

Leaving behind how amazing flying is (or isn't, it's all quite subjective) for the moment and getting back to the proper stuff, raiding!

For two weeks in a row now we have really struggled on Socrethar.
I thought we were beyond this to be honest, with multiple smooth kills with both this guild and the previous one.

But suddenly, it seems like a scramble to get the kill.  Last week, we relied on our Monk healer's Touch of Death to finish him off with only 3 of us left alive.

I'm not exactly sure what is going wrong but I have an unusual hypothesis surrounding the ghosts... We are too focused on them so some are getting through!

I know, I know, that makes no sense.

It all relates to our positioning.
We start off nicely grouped around the boss and our 'Construct' tank puts down a line of green fire to the ghost portal.

This, I think, is our first mistake.  I would really like two lines of fire for the ghosts, side by side (which he sometimes does anyway but not every time).

Moving on... the first Gifts come in and we adjust our positioning so nobody is taking extra damage.  We are generally ok at this point, all the ghosts are dying quickly, but you can see the start of the issue.

The next set of Gifts come in and this is where it really starts to go wrong.

The focus on killing the ghosts is so high that people now start to spread away from the boss so they can still hit the ghosts but not be hit by the Gifts.

Now the ghosts start to spread out which both makes them harder to AoE down and moves them out of the slowing effect of the fire.

Without that fire, those ghosts move fast!  Sometimes we can still clear a wave but sometimes we can't, maybe because the Dominator is up at the same time.

Once one ghost gets through it's a downward spiral as the fears can allow others through, and we head towards a wipe.

My frustration then rises because the leadership blame the wipe on ghosts getting through, fair enough, but they don't seem to understand why the ghosts escaped.

I assume they think that some people are just staying on the boss rather than switching to kill ghosts so they re-affirm the need for Ranged to make sure no ghosts escape.

The Ranged then try harder to kill the ghosts but, instead of helping, this just makes the problem worse as people spread further in an attempt to position themselves for the ghosts.

Tonight, I am going to suggest the 'ghostbuster' approach. 
This will be a massive shock to the leadership convinced we need more damage on the ghosts if I can prove to them that it only needs 2-3 people assigned, if everyone else can get the positioning right.

Wish me luck!







Wednesday 2 September 2015

The Flying Patch...

Today's the Day!

Or yesterday in other parts of the world but let's not quibble over details.

We all get to fly in Draenor!

As I've already said, this doesn't really interest me much. 
Yes, travel will be a bit quicker and easier.  Yes, I might actually do some Archaeology now.  Yes, some things will be more convenient.

I've enjoyed my time on the ground though, fighting (not always successfully) through the wildlife to reach my destination, and I will miss it greatly. 
Not enough to keep me grounded now I have the ability to fly but I will still miss it.

It's like the Masterplan addon.
That addon took almost all of the gameplay out of follower missions but made the whole process so much faster, and that is all that people cared about.
People wanted the reward but the gameplay itself was seen as more of an obstacle than something to be enjoyed.

I fell into the trap of using the addon so that I could be more efficient and run through missions on a series of alts, removing gameplay I actually enjoyed.
(Maybe the rewards from the follower missions were too powerful for such niche gameplay but that's another debate.)

With the latest patch, the 'gameplay' of travelling around Draenor has effectively been removed.  Now there is only the reward, the destination.

This is not some niche mini-game like follower missions though, this is the actual open world game, and I believe our remaining time on Draenor will be greatly diminished by it's removal.

So I'm not excited by flying, I am excited by the new rares though! 

More stuff to throw lightning and lava at!

I'm hoping they have some mechanics to deal with, some level of difficulty attached, to make them challenging.  But maybe that is more the realm of the world boss rather than a rare mob.

I'm also excited by the Timewalker dungeons in Icecrown this weekend, should have some fun there.

And there is also a new raid week, can we further our progress in Hellfire Citadel?
Maybe, but I'll probably miss the actual progress as I'm off to see Foo Fighters on Sunday which is exciting me quite a bit more than everything else  :-)

Tuesday 1 September 2015

Confused about Flying...

I've completed my Pathfinder achievement and tomorrow is the big day!

Flying arrives in Draenor!

I know lots of people are really excited about this so I decided to think long and hard about all the ways that flying would improve my play in Draenor...

1.  My alts won't have that ridiculous journey down to the shipyard and back to do their missions.

2.  I won't need a summon for Kazzak.

Er... what's all the fuss about again?