Next: Kalecgos

Last night's third Illidan Kill (which Netted my the Faceplate, and T6 Chest!) has officially moved him off the progression list, and onto the farm list. This meen progression for LOKI has officically shifted to Sunwell!

I was hoping to get us there Sunday after Illidan, but things took a little longer. We're trying to get everyone in for a kill, and sometimes there are hickups.  So Tuesday, we go in guns-(and/or arrows)-a-blazin. 

I know I should be deciding on a "goal" for progression before the XPac hits, but I really don't want to limit myself. From a guild that spent less then three hours on their first Bloodboil, Shaz, and RoS kills - I'd like to think that execution is a strong point of ours. Ergo, Kalecgos should go down pretty easy. 

As for Brutallus - what we lack in warglaves, may potentially be made up in 3.0. I haven't heard if they are altering enrage timers to fit the health nerf. If they are, or if 3.0 is just going to make things easier in general, that may remove the potential roadblock of not having 1+ Warglave Set Rogues. 

Besides progression, I need to do a typical bank cleaning. I still have MC/BWL items in there that are just too sentamental. While the pet/mount space being freed up is nice, armor is really my weak point. While I know player housing is probably never happening, I can still dream of an armor rack I can put my dusty old plate onto, and view its antiquated majesty.

I also want to set up my alts for more permant storage. I plan on banking virtually all of the ore I mine while leveling, either towards getting some of the crafted blacksmithing gear, or rerolling BS if the Mining health buff isn't doing it for me come raid time. 

Illidan Kill Two, and Return to SSC

Our second Illidan Kill took just under an hour, from zoning to looting - something like four attempts. Considering we had a different flame tank, at least two new healers, and a handful of new DPS - it was really great. Another thing I'm particularly happy about, is that this entire weeks BT clear and Illidan kill has happened in the immediate wake of the Guild Master title changing hands. We haven't missed a step, in what is typically a guild shattering event. I'm just rather happy with everyone today: Our old GM (for orchistrating this change so well), our officers (for their continued support), and our Raiders in general (for their great performance, and confidence in me). 

I should mention - I nearly wiped us. Right before the last transition into Demon Phase, we were at ~3%. I stayed in too long, hoping we'd kill him, and built an unfortunatly large amount of threat on the demon. When I realzied I should get out of there, I ended up getting a portion of the raid shadow blasted once or twice. We still got the demons down and finished the last 3%, but I felt rather silly.

So, with our remaining two hours, I made the call to go to SSC so we can do half of the Hand of Ad'al title stuff (Fathomlord Quest, and Vial). We skipped Hydross, Lurker, Morogrim, and killed Fathomlord in two attempts (on the first, we had the hunter pet tank go down from a Cataclysmic Bolt). Considering that probably half the raid hadn't seen the fight previously, it only added to my general satisfaction.  Many people got their quest from the guy-in-a-cage.

We went to Vashj next, but were unfortunatly running out of time.  We didn't have any of the ranged DPS officers that had done assignments for sides back when we did it last night, so our Melee DPS officer had to quickly throw those together. That was unorganized, which didn't make healing assignments easy. In the end, we only did one attempt. Rather then keep the raid late on a non-progression night, I polled people, and all those that needed vials said they could make a impromptu Monday raid - so thats the plan tonight. In retrospect - we should have killed Lurker so we wouldn't have to reclear trash, but I suppose those are the breaks. 

Illidan Down, and Guild Master-Ness

3rd Attempt of Last Night. Everyone did awesome from start to finish, and those last 30% just slipped away. A total of 12 Hours was spent by LOKI.

Kill Shot

Pose

Illidan was certainly the most difficult fight I've tanked - requiring an insane amount of concentration, flawless shield blocking, positioning, and cooldown managment. All of the traps placed in p5 were terrible, so I ate all the enrages (which really weren't that bad). I'm glad that I did it pre 3.0, when Sheer is supossedly getting removed (I'd liken it to Archimonde having Fear removed - a fairly key part of the fight). 

After the dust had setteled, and the phat (non-tank) loots distributed, Ruffianx (our GM) did some promoting. He had announced a week prior that he would be leaving WoW to get a better grip on his real life, but wanted to finish Illidan with us. I was made the new Guild Master of LOKI, a change that seems to have been well recieved by everyone. Jerey, our Paladin tank, was promoted to Tanking Officer.

I believe I'll be able to lead LOKI to future glory in Wrath and Beyond (with the invaluable assistance of our officer base), but it will certainly be a different place without Ruffianx. 

Realm Forum Post Here.

Current Progression: Illidan

Last night was LOKI's first full (3-Hour) night on Illidan. We got to P5 on our last attempt, after discovering a number of places mistakes can happen, and fixing them - noteworthy ones include spacing out (duh), deciding on a parasite kill location, NOT dpsing through the p3->4 transition (and getting the raid shadow blasted), and making sure all shadow demons are slowed.

Prior to this, we had gotten to spend ~1 hour on him after killing council. That night we consistently got through p1, were learning mechanics of flame tanking and positioning, and got to p3/4 once (shadow demons owning everyone with so many dps dead when we got to p4).

Note: Bosskillers is wrong. The only thing you need to do in p2, is make sure every player is within 20~25 yards from one warglave (not both). The only person this really effects, are the flame tanks, who can't go too far away from the glave there flame came form. We used three camps in the middle. 

Anyway - Sheer. Good news is, I know where my sheer button is, and haven't had issues with it - but this has taken some considerable rewiring on my part. For those unaware - Sheer is an ability Illidan uses in P1, 3, and 5. It cannot miss - and if not dodged, blocked, or parried - reduces your max health by 60% for something like 8 seconds. The key to not getting Sheered, is to shield block. Sheer needs to be saved for when he actually starts casting it (1.5 second cast) -elsewise, his rapid dual wielding attacks would eat through the charges. He doesn't crush, so it can safely be reserved. 

What I've done, is replace my shield block / shield slam button, with just shield slam. I then put shield block where shield reflect use to be - and mentelly pretend that its a spell that needs to be reflected. Now, I both click and keypress. I keypress my most often used abilities (threat rotation) - 2,3,4,3,2 (SS, Dev, Rev, Dev, SS...), and click less used abilities (TC, Ironshield Potions, Spell Reflect, ect). What I did for this fight, was put a supersized bar with those above abilities right under Illidan's cast bar - this lets me watch that for Sheer, Flame Crash, ect - while having those abilities to click right there. I find that he will often do a flame crash (requiring strafing and backing up) and then sheer while he's still moving. This setup allows me to move with the keyboard, and click shield block when needed.

So - P1 is easy. P2 is getting finished consistently, now that we've settled on a set two tanks (Feral Druid, who has the highest threat in FR gear), and Protection Paladin (extra blessings, judgements, ect) - though melee still will lose one or two if they aren't careful dpsing flames. I watched Illidan, called sides for eyebeam and barrage, and spammed shield reflect (his fireball damage is reflectable). P3 is generally smooth, but the P3-> P4 needs refinement, making sure all slowing effects are up, prioritising which demons to kill (and having the DPS there/alive) - as well as not being close to people for the flame barrage thing (3.5k fireballs on everyone that splash). 

I think the low point (personally) of the night was on that last attempt, where we got to p5, watching the cinematic, and I got owned right after it was over / the bubbles ended. 

I took three nice hits that just added up to my health, with no hots up, delayed heals, and no ironshield/commanding shout/TC/Demo (it had worn off in the bubble, nothing could be cast on me, ect). I think everyone was just excited that we had got there, and hadn't been ready to refocus (myself included) - but I plan on using some cooldowns next time preemptivly, regardless. Anyway, we got him to 28% with a rogue evasion tanking, until he started to draw soul all over the place.

I predict we will kill him this coming week. 

Oh, and pictures will be included whenever I get home.