Sarabian's WoW Blog

It's been a busy time for us lately. Kheldarrek is sporting a ton of good gear and really only has one or two items to upgrade unless I start doing 25s. *shudders* The nice thing is that his offspec gear is almost as good as his mainspec, and that's pretty good really. Main spec is 5597gs right now and off is low 5500s.

Pookiebear is also sporting a lot of nice stuff, but only on his main spec. 5551gs isn't too bad for a toon that doesn't raid full time. Kheldarrek went with Varj's group last week and Pookie went with the normal group.

I really enjoy playing in a raiding guild. There are many good people, and generally the whiners are rooted out earlier rather than later. That is a good thing, because I really can't stand whiners. That's why I refuse to do 25 man raids. Once Cataclysm is out and gear is the same for both 10s and 25s, I'll be a VERY happy Orc.

Over a month since I posted anything on the old blog. I suck. Yes, I know I do, so shoosh!

The guy that took over the 3rd raid lead slot? Kicked out of the guild with all of his cronies. Did I know it was coming? Unfortunately, yes I did. Those types of people send a warning up my spine, and he did as soon as I met him.

I'm still in Raid 2 and we're still stonewalling at Sindragosa. He can get down to about 11% and then we take too many casualties. The massive amount of movement that is required in the last phase is a real bitch. I think we'll get it, but it'll take a bit of time.

Kheldarrek is almost Revered with the Ashen Verdict, so will get the new ring soon. I love upgrades! That's another reason to hope we down Sindragosa - the dragon has my healer shield!

I also like the holiday boss being right in the LFD tool for easy queueing. Thrag is now 78 and able to queue, and I ran it until I got the agility cloak. Now when he hits 80, he'll immediately have a nice i232 cloak to put on. I really should make the nice i200 engineering gun for starting heroics on him. I just hate the thought of running a DPS thru chain heroics with the wait time they have. Ewww!

So, Pookie is kinda stagnant right now as he isn't raid tanking. Kheldarrek is waiting on upgrades from raiding and is almost done with all of the off set items he can get from Triumph emblems. The off set is almost as good as the main now. Sarabian still get used for the odd heroic, but that's about it now. He is sporting mostly i232 with a couple i226 tier pieces. 3 i200 items (2 are trinkets) and one i219 item are all that he'll be able to upgrade with emblems of triumph, so unless I suddenly start raiding with him instead of doing the raid tank with the Pook, he's done with the upgrades until Cataclysm.

That's all for now, so see you in another month!

Or so...

Ok, raid leading sucks. There are too many babies and whiners. They want you to do everything, including make them move faster. Screw that.

I asked Varjeal to find someone else to take that crap so I can just worry about me. He found someone almost immediately, but I'm not sure about them yet. We went Saturday into ICC and he seemed to be flailing about quite a bit. We only downed Marrowgar and wiped like 6 times on Lady Deathwhisper. I'm not seeing any real leadership going on. I'm seeing someone that is young and idealistic with a ton of "I want to..." and little actual talent for doing it.

Maybe the whining is just a part of the leading and I should just ignore it and go on. Let it roll off like nothing and try to keep on track.

Then again, there is also the constant struggle to have people actually show up. They expect to be absent for any reason and still have a raid spot. They expect to arrive unprepared and still have a raid spot.

I may tell Varjeal that I'd be willing to give it another shot if this guy doesn't cut it - which he well may not.

But I am happy just being a raid tank and beating up on bosses. When we went Saturday, the new leader respecced feral tank and was going to be the main tank for the evening. That is when I realized how competent I actually am as a tank. As a druid tank, he was pushing 51k health raid buffed. I was just over 53k. He was grabbing stuff and saying "I'll take this guy, you get the other". I grabbed the other one and brought it over to his like I'm supposed to and tanked it. Before his died, I got aggro on it just from tanking mine. I also had to watch myself on Marrowgar while I was waiting for my debuff to go away because I was pulling aggro. I managed it easily once I noticed it, but it was annoying.

Monday, the second night of the raid, we only had 6 people and all the other guildies were in ICC 25 with another guild. No extras to call upon. We ended up not going to the raid. A few of us decided to grab some of the heroic achievements and keep going towards the red proto-drake, and I think the raid leader was a touch put off because we didn't invite him along.

We'll see how things go and see if we'll need to make a change again.

Monday night went very well. There were a few people that were out, but we filled from the guild ranks and off we went to Onyxia 10 again. I once again flubbed the pull - this time on the very first try - and then we downed her with hardly a hiccup.

Things were going so nicely that we decided to go take out another dragon. On to Sartharion's Lair! There were 4 people that had yet to take him out, so I thought this would be a great opportunity to get that taken care of. It worked out very well, and we got him down on the first try.

Next week I want to do the weekly raid and then the rest of Saturday and all of Monday night will be in ToC 10. Level 232 content of that type should be very fun for everyone and hopefully profitable. Once we do ToC, I'll see if we're ready to head into ICC. Since there are several people that are new to raiding, I don't want to move too fast. I also don't want to move too slow. It should be fun to see how everything works out.

Tomorrow I think we'll do the weekly raid (Malygos) and then go see what we can do in ToC10. It will mainly depend on how well we do in ToC as to what we will do Monday night. I'll ask the group if they want to do the rest of ToC or go to Onyxia again. I'm kind of leaning towards seeing if we can clear ToC10 in 2 nights. If we can't, I may just extend the lockout and see if we can then clear it in 4 nights. I'd love to have us see all of the bosses.

I also want to name the group. I think it gives a bit of unity to have a group with an actual name in it. Maybe not "Ballet Dancing Chimps" but definitely something. Maybe "Dragons" or something simple. We'll see what the group thinks.

Internet is restored and I am running all kinds of things. Now that I am in Grievous and once again raiding regularly, I was asked if I would like to lead the third guild raiding group.

/gasp

Really? Lead the next raid group? The one that will enable us to field a 25 man one day soon? Hell ya!

Last night was the first official run of it. We went to Onyxia's Lair and stood outside for about 15 minutes while I went over the hellos, everyone introduced themselves, and we went over fight mechanics. We then went inside a got her to 56% on the first try. We reassembled and buffed, then got her to 46%. Even better!

Try #3 doesn't really count due to the fact that I flubbed the pull. We'll just go on now.

Official try #3 got her down to 0%. Yup, the first night a new raid group ran - with almost half of it brand new to raiding - we took down a 232 boss. Loot was passed out (new loot rules go into effect the next run this Saturday night), and grats were given all around. This is going to be fun.

So, I'm on my paladin a couple days ago and decide that I'd like to try running the Icecrown 5-mans. I know I'm only running iLevel 200-219 items so I'm not wanting to try doing any but the first one on heroic. Even the first one is a bit iffy unless the group pays attention.

I queue for the first one and immediately get a group (YAY for being a tank!). I inform them that I'm playing a toon that was in mothballs for a while, so they should try to not out-aggro me. We start and I only needed to taunt a couple times. They nuked things fairly well and we pretty easily ran through the instance. I was disappointed that most of them decided to drop group at the end since I was thinking they might want to do another. Oh well.

This one had gone so well I decided to try for the second in the series and queued up for that. Well, that didn't go so well. I got children except for one guy (a warlock) that was very rational and even said he'd stay with me if I wanted to try again.

The mage in the group was especially hilarious. He did over 6k DPS and just would not pull back or tone it down in any way. Hmm, so the idea is to go into i232 content with an i213 tank and go all out.

And OF COURSE he was one of those children that started screaming "YOU SUCK! QUIT THE GAME QUIT THE GAME QUIT THE GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!1".

I tried to explain to the kid that all he had to do was tone down the DPS, but apparently that just can't happen.

This is why I am in a guild that requires it's members to be at least 18 in real life. It doesn't totally stop immaturity, but it really helps. Really.

I do think that next time I'll either go with a group of friends, or queue for it on normal. Might work out a bit better. Actually, I need to do Halls of Reflection on normal anyhow to try for that tank shield. I want that on both the warrior and the paladin.

Well, a lot has happened that I haven't bothered putting on here. I don't know why other than I just didn't want to take the time.

Clan of the Dragons is not and never will be a raiding guild. I tried as well as the people that volunteered to be officers. It didn't work out. We put forth a lot of effort and it was rewarded by people signing up for an event and then not even being online during it. Many many times. Screw that.

So now I have moved Pookiebear (now my main), Kheldarrek, and Sarabian over to Grievous and Thrag is now GM of the Clan. Pookiebear is tanking as often as I can get him to. With my not having internet at home, it's hard to get on most times, but I manage as much as I can. I'd like to run heroics a ton and get a ton of emblems for gear, but it's just not in the cards now.

Once I get internet back (perhaps later today) I'll get back to running stuff all the time again. Once I can do that, I'll slam heroics all the time and gear up both the tanking set and the DPS set. I enjoy warrior tanking and playing on my Pookiebear. I plan to get more of that done here soon.

Clan of the Dragons will not be a raiding guild. The efforts thus far have proven fruitless, and I'm done trying.

I'll be moving the paladin to another server, the shaman to another raiding guild, and the warrior might also move there. The guild will be moved to my hunter and be a casual friend's guild permanently.

Oh, well.

Well, the Night Spirits raid group is officially back together and with a time I can do! From 9-11pm Thursday and Friday nights, we will be hitting Naxxramas with mostly fresh 80s as a progression group. We'll still rock out the heroics and the new 5-man trio, but this group was started to progress through content just like the old groups did.

I'm going to go on my shaman and probably be a healer, but might be the "hybrid" that can bounce back and forth between healing and DPSing depending on the fight. I am really looking forward to this, as I haven't been raiding since Baille became the cowardly asshole and I stopped going with his elitist ass. This group is all about having fun. There are certain expectations, but unlike what they wanted in the "Mangoes" group, this group is reasonable. Run heroics, grab the emblem gear and some of the gear from the end bosses in the heroics and you're good. Bring a couple flasks, some food, and your potions along for the ride and just do your part.

When needed, "Roll for blame".

The big difference in this group will be that almost all of us have been here on other characters doing other roles, but we will still have the experience of being long-time raiders. We'll all know the fights. We'll all know how to do the safety dance and frogger. Almost no one will need fight explanations, we'll just need to adapt to doing them in a different role.

I always tanked in Naxxramas. Now I'll be healing and DPSing. I always wore plate. Now I'll be slightly more squishy.

Damn this is gonna be fun.

Someone has started my mind rolling on the whole attunement process in World of Warcraft. I remember having to do long quests to get attuned to the Molten Core, Onyxia's Lair, and even into Karazhan. Long, epic quest lines that lead you into a dozen and more instances. The need to encounter and overcome dozens of instance bosses and other quests people just to get the honor of opening the door and walking into a new instance.

All of it starts with the need to do the Library wing in Scarlet Monastery to get the key that opens the doors to the Armory and the Cathedral wings. How happy were we when we, at the tender level of but 32 or so, were able to open the door to the harder areas whenever we wanted. How many of us back "in the day" went into Armory just to see the place?

Who can forget the attunement quests to gain entrance to the Molten Core? A much harder place to get into and a MUCH harder place to conquer. Many guilds were unable to finish MC before they were off into Outlands and the scores of instances there - many of which required attunements or at the very least keys. The need to kill Talon King Ikiss before getting the key to enter Shadow Labs was great. Everyone knew that was one of the things you needed to get done before you could advance.

Then we were off on the grand adventure that was the epic quest chain leading to permission to enter Karazhan. Everyone wanted into Karazhan. It took many guilds over a year to fully clear the place. I remember walking around in full Tier 4 with all of my other items at the same level and being proud to do it. Sure, there were people in T6 and even a few in T7, but so many still didn't even have T4 when Wrath released. I also remember that it was almost painful to exchange that Tier gear for quest blues later on. It helped when I started again getting Tier epics, but it still wasn't easy to replace the old stuff we had worked so hard to get in the first place.

I think they should bring back the need to attune or at least get a key or something to enter the really good stuff. Icecrown Citadel is about to be opened, and I think we will be able to just walk right into the front door, no matter what you have or have not completed.

Some suggestions that I have heard and very much agree with are:

1. Make a key that is account bound. I think a key box that is soulbound, but that will make account bound keys would be a great idea. Work one guy up to being able to get in so that you have experienced the content and completed the challenge. After that, you are given the ride on your alternates.

2. In order to enter hard mode on a raid, all members of the raid must have completely cleared the raid on normal mode.

3. Here is my idea: In order to advance to a harder raid instance, you have to complete the raid instances before it. As an example, you must clear Naxxramas before you are "attuned" to enter Ulduar. Simply clearing the place gives you access to the next level. Clearing 10 man Naxxramas allows you to enter 25 man Ulduar.

If those were implemented, Naxxramas would still be chock full of people and everyone would be more than happy to go there. After all, no one minded running their alts through Karazhan before they went into Serpentshrine Cavern and then Black temple.

Make the game a challenge that is hard enough to overcome while at the same time being easy enough for most people to do. It's too easy this time around. Accomplishments mean nothing anymore because everyone has them.

I enjoy being the GM. I enjoy seeing people greet me when I come on. I even enjoy the mail messages and whispers about issues and things that need done. That's part of leading an active guild.

I do not enjoy silence.

You heard me, I do not enjoy silence. It appears that not a few people that joined the Clan are alts. After the initial excitement of the new guild wore off, they went back to mostly playing their mains and we are again left with few people on each night and nowhere near enough to run instances daily as I want to.

I also hate recruiting. Too much typing for me. I don't mind talking to people, but I'm not into typing that much while trying to play a game. Interviews to try to weed out the smacktards are not fun for anyone really. Fortunately my son (a guild officer) enjoys them and is the one that has recruited most of the members.

I guess I'll have to actually start doing them if I want more activity. Damn.

Out wonderful web mistress here at the library was kind enough to put together this great logo for the guild. It doesn't show the drop shadow on the black background, but it actually has a transparent background and everything has a slight shadow to it. Wonderful work and I think that once I make my own site and get things moving on it, this will be a great logo on it. For now I have to just use it here due to the present site(?) being on Guild Portal and them not allowing me to use my own logo unless I pay. I am not planning on paying. I have a spare web server that really has no mission in life right now that I could easily wipe and use as a dedicated server for the Clan. I can pop it in at the same place I have the TeamSpeak server and away it would go.

Hmm, I may just do that.

Clan of the Dragons, my guild, has exploded with membership. It seems people are actually looking for a nice guild that does things and doesn't treat people badly if their gear isn't "uber" good. We had our first guild meeting using TeamSpeak last night and it went quite well. Many people signed up to use the TS server and contributed to the meeting.

We'll be running instances daily and hopefully as soon as we get enough 80s, we'll start running a heroic a day (at least) as well. Once we get people up to a decent level of gear and have 10 we can use regularly, we'll dive into the depths of Naxxramas. As far as I can tell it drops the same emblems as the heroics do now, so it'll be a nice farm for that, as well as teaching everyone how to work as a team. Most of the people in the guild have yet to raid, so I'm looking forward to getting everyone up to speed. I think we're going to have a blast.

We're not all geared for TotC, and you know what? That's just fine. We don't all have the top iLevel gear, either. That's ok, too. When we are on, we are having a fun time playing a game. I actually think this is more fun, because when someone gets a new item they aren't crunching the numbers to see if this piece beats what they have by 0.00000001%. They are just happy that they downed a raid boss and got epic items. It's a big deal to them. It's fun. Isn't that why we all "play" a "game"??

Now I need to get a guild logo made up somehow. I think I'll go prowl around and talk to the two people I know that are good with graphics.

Well, I have left the little group that I was raiding with for several years. The raid leader turned into a self-righteous pompous asshat after his real life friends joined him. He steadily got more and more distant to me, all the while acting friendly on the surface.

I cannot stand a coward. If you want someone to go away to make room for another friend, then fucking tell them. Don't just ignore them and all the while be doing shit that is rude and a slap in the face. Be a fucking man and tell them that you don't want them around. I just cannot abide a coward. Add to that a vast sense of superiority and arrogance, and Baille turned into exactly the type of person he left Eye of the Tiger to get away from. Congratulations, you pathetic asshole. Fuck you, coward.

Now I will build up Clan of the Dragons and make my own group. I stress that we are here to have fun while doing 10 man raids. We will be doing them, but we will not be anal and arrogant. We will go to have fun playing a game. We will gear up our characters, but we won't be at the bleeding edge of content. We will begin by getting the core group geared in heroics and then move to Naxxramas. Even though the stuff you get in Naxx isn't top of the line, it will be improvements over what they have and it will help them learn how to work as a group. I want to make this group what Baille's group was in the beginning. I also really want to prevent it from ever becoming what his did. Time will tell how this will work out, but I am quite determined that I will rise up and again have fun playing the game I so enjoy.

Yes, Sarabian has indeed gotten this title. Last night we ran two heroics and they were both pugs. Metallash healed both of them for me and I tanked them. We went into the Old Kingdom and handed them their butt in one of the best pugs I have been in for quite some time. Only the warlock was less than outgoing, but that was only because he didn't say anything much and as soon as the last boss was down, he vanished. We also got an achievement on each boss. Look me up on Armory to see which ones we got, but I got a ton of them last night. We also had some efficiency pulling that was no problem at all.

The second run was into Drak'Tharon Keep, where I had the next pug and it was just as awesome as the first. We had a rogue, Metallash (a priest) and three paladins. Awesome tasty goodness was ours for the picking. We buzzed thru it in record time and Metallash only died once. I'm not even entirely sure how he died. We got him back up and buffed and we were off again in like 60 seconds. Also had efficiency pulls here - some of them pretty bad. The first one was where we basically pulled the entire row of mobs after the second boss in two pulls. No one died and they were handled easily. Right after that we went up the steps and grabbed the two mobs there - and the rogue got feared into the next group. She went down at our feet and the mobs got picked up and handled quickly. Brought her back up and off we went to the last boss and my title. I also managed to clear out an old quest and get an achievement got completing a quest line.

After we finished up the heroics, I was invited by old raiding friends to do Headless Horseman. Nothing dropped for me and I was reminded again that some people still (for totally unknown reasons) want you to pass on all loot and then /roll. Totally stupid today as you can not only trade items, but in a 5-man with people that know each other it's a waste of time. We can handle loot easily enough. Oh well, their group, their rules. When I lead a group we use the buttons.

All in all it was a very fun evening and good things were to be had.

Since Sarabian has it now, I figured a good plan would be to have Pookiebear tank H:UP when it's the heroic daily and get the sword as well. Ya. Good plan. Too bad the loot gods are apparently still screwing with me. That mail belt dropped yet again, only to be sharded by our overgeared group. Oh well, next time I see that UP is the daily I'll try again. I'm not going to waste time otherwise.

I only need 3 heroics on Sarabian to be "Sarabian, Champion of the Frozen Wastes". Halls of Lightning, Drak'Tharon Keep, and Old Kingdom. I hope to get those soon and have my title. I'm also working on getting the raptor mount from Un'Goro. I only need 12 more dailies and both Pookie and Sarabian will have the black raptor. Sarabian has also started working on rep for Wyrmrest to eventually get that mount. I figure he'll look good on a red drake.

Doing the best to get my heroics in and get the "Champion of the Frozen Wastes" title. I only have 3 more heroics and Eye of Eternity. I'll be going to EoE on Friday night late, so hopefully I'll have my heroics completed by then and can have my title by week's end.

Also, started to run the daily quests to get my raptor mount from Un'Goro Crater. It's not hard at all, it just takes time as you have to do a daily for 20 days to get the mount. Easy Peasy Lemon Sqeezy compared to getting the Netherdrake.

Now I need to start working on getting more rep. I'm only exalted with one faction, but revered with 8. Something is not right about that.

I also really need to get enchants on what decent gear I do have for my Retribution set. I'm getting more stuff for it, but with no enchants, it's not really cutting it. I should be well over 2k DPS, but am only bringing 1.4 or so. Time to get busy.