Two Drakes

We'd all shown up for the raid Sunday, serious faces on, bags bulging with consumables. And then, as if it was on farm, we cleanly one-shot two-drake OS. It was pretty sweet (And I managed to randomly avoid getting hit by lava strike?)

I had spent the fight tanking Sarathon. The only sketchy part with two drakes, is when the first is dead, and the second is still up - so he's hitting 25% harder, and I have 25% less HP (about 30,000). I'm going to need to figure out who's going to MT him when we do three drakes though - we have no set Tanking DK, and our one feral druid is typically Cat. So we may need to pretty up one of them, or just get a good rotation of abilities up to keep me swinging through the huge lava breaths.

We then found ourselves with all the T7 Content Cleared, and nearly the full night open. So, we went back to Sunwell to finished what we started in BC.

It was embarrassingly easy. Kalecgos was just a matter of getting enough people into portals, and not killing the dragon prematurely. Brutallus was cake. Felmyst's breath still does work, though, and we had to go back a second time on her since people forgot that being ten levels above the content does not make you move from area to area faster. Twins was fast. Muru was fast. And then KJ didn't even get to casting Darkness of a Thousand Souls, so we pretty much just had to shove DPS down his throat until he returned to the nether. The event after was pretty cool to watch. And the whole clear only took us about 45 min.

So then there we were with half the night still unspent. So we kept working out way down the chain, and went to BT, with the hopes that perhaps there was still a legendary on our loot tables for the night. Lo-And-Behold - an Off-Hand Warglave did drop!

It's LOKI's first legendary (we had pretty terrible luck back in BC). And all of BT only took ~45 min.

And then to round off the evening, I was able to convince Aertimus to come to an Arena with me, so I could get those ten achievement points for winning one. It took "Im lost Where is Naxx" three tries, but we ended up taking out a Feral Druid / Rogue combo. I felt bad by the end, since Aert kept getting focus-fired really hardcore and knocked out early. But we did it.

So now we're left to OS-3D, Immortal, and a handful of other misc. achievements. I'm going to need to figure out what our specific plans are for extra raid time, though - as I'm hearing that not everyone was excited about filling out Sunday with T6. I imagine much of it will be spent on 3-D OS, but it can't hurt to have plans.

Words For Pictures

Ok - Here we go. Pictures and words, together!

Yakra the Paladin! (Yakradin?). After much necropolis hunting, and taking out a few invasions with a three-man group, I got the two rare pieces (but not before getting four cloth legs, and 3 leather legs). With my trinket-granted Consecrate and (soon to be) Hallowed title, I'll be dancing in the light!

I was out for the weekend, and ended up making the call to not rush home on Sunday for the raid - opting rather to spend some time with friends I only get to see once a month. Its hard to not be there (ontime) for a progression night, but I have bags full of confidence in my officers and raiders. I got home around the time of the first pull, but decided to just let them ride things out with the tanks that were in. Aertimus hoped in about mid way though (for lack of healers), and I got to watch the kill on her computer. It was pretty sweet.

Mu'ru! I don't know how people did sides without Shockwave (or rather, I just know that it was done with extreme difficulty, the likes of which I sadly was not able to encounter). We didn't have a ton of time to work on him, but we got entropus to 46% the one time we got to p2. I was kiting him faster then I should, and feel like the erratically placed black holes probably were a factor in the wipe, but I'm confident we'll rock him next night we're in there.

At one point between fighting waves, I looked off to the side and realized I was looking at the Sunwell. The spot that I floated by in the MGT cinematic, and figured I'd never get to. I had a similar moment fighting Felmyst, and realizing that I was in the spot that I'd flown by during bombing runs. It's a little surreal.

Oh, and as a last min note (and a rare, PvP one at that), I got the achievement for running/capping the flag all three times (Ironman), and the 3-0 victory, in WSG last night. Do Darkspear/Cyclone Horde run premade losing WSG now, or did I get stupid lucky? (going to need Vene's insight here). Ally usually get roflstomped on Cyclone WSG.

Sunwell Letdown

First night in since the patch - 

One Shot Kalecgos

The biggest chalange was holding DPS on the dragon, while portals got going and we could DPS the Demon.

Four-Shot Brut

Our issue was placing people so they took a slash, but only one slash, and we had paths for burned people to run. His melee damage was high, but not OMGWTFPWN high. No Sunwell Radiance helped.

While I've attributed our fast progress through T5 and 6 to our skill and ability - I just couldn't even kid myself about these two kills. We killed two new bosses tonight because the place was nerfed to hell. And frankly, I feel cheated.

I was looking forward to a chalange, and 3.0 has destroyed any left in the game. Guilds that were working Muru killed him the first time back after 3.0, and then got KJ in a night or two beyond that. I can't imagine that we'll be that far behind.

I'm excited to see the content, but only as much as I would be if I went back to AQ40, to kill the stuff I never got a chance to. The execution is still required, but even that is far more forgiving then it use to be because of the difference between level of content, and power of raid.

First Sunwell Experience

I haven't been to the Isle in a long time, with raiding and leveling alts doing most of my funding. I had forgotten the sometimes epic world PvP (the only kind I can really get into) that can happen, and started up a pre-raid group to teach some gank-happy members of the opposite faction a lesson or two in unfair. My secret trick, is to wear my T6, equip my Torch of the Damned, and pretend I'm a full S3 Warrior. Its great when they try to focus fire me down =D

But anyway - PvE. Sunwell trash was pretty easy, rolling along with three mages. The scouts (think of ZA scouts, only 26k HP, unsnarable, and they summon super robots of doom) only wiped us once, and I'm certain that was only because I didn't know about a hidden inactive protector that it had the chance to run to. We ended up getting one trash epic (Healing Wand), two smelting books, and two sunmotes.

And then Kalecgos. I've missed fighting Dragons - Ever since Ony/BWL, I haven't fought a real, fleshy dragon (aka, not Nightbane). He did not disappoint.

Our best attempt was 44%/56%, which I don't think is too bad (first number is the dragon's health, second is the demon's - and both have to die at virtually the same time). He was far squishier then I was expecting, but arcane buffet and the Demon's damage potential was not to be underestimated. There's so much to communicate, I think parsing what we actually say on vent will get important. 

The biggest problem we had was probably getting enough heals into the first portal, along with the tank. Our first tank in the demon realm was consistently being killed, which left no one to relieve me in the dragon realm - which led to me dying. Not a terrible problem, and one that I'm sure there are a few ways we can figure out how to deal with.

Our tank lead mentioned that he had read a ~190 Arcane Resist tank could solo tank the dragon the whole time, and resist enough arcane buffets to live comfortablly. I think this is something I'm going to look into seriously, as tank transitions in general can be messy (HoTs not being on, casts needing to be restarted, ect).

And so we press on!