Reflecting on a full day of WoW

I took the day off of work today to play WoW.  Now, let’s not get hasty in our thoughts that I might be addicted (I might be, but that’s not what’s at play here.)  You see, I took a vacation day, which I planned a few months ago, because Sona is a Wheel of Time fan. And she is currently gasping about something in the last book of a 14 book series.  She took the day off to enjoy this monumental work of fiction all in one day. Yes, she reads that fast. To keep our vacation time in sync, we tend to take these days together. So, since she wanted to read her book, I planned a day of WoW.

The Plan Was an Unmitigated Success

I had one goal for today. Breige was about 15% into level 89 when I got up this morning. I wanted to get her to 90. Nothing else was on my plate. Just get Breige to 90. She did that at about 3:45.

I knew what the next step of my plan for Breige was, but I wasn’t really prepared to implement it.  Next up was getting her i-level up to 425 435. Tyledres was on, and I asked her if she would like to do some heroics when I got my item level sorted out. She thought that was a grand plan, and I went about trying to do so. I was struggling. I didn’t want to just grab PvP gear. I wanted to do it right.  While I was thinking I only needed to get to 425, I went and picked up some 408 gear to replace my 399 gear. And I went ahead and grabbed the PvP gloves, giving me 426. That’s when I realized I had failed my reading check. So I needed 9 more points. Perusal of the guild bank yielded a Long-Ranged Trillium Rifle and a Ghost Iron Dragonling.

Frustrated, I went to the Auction House and saw the Quick Strike Cloak, realized I could buy the pattern, but hadn’t yet, and made it myself. Still not enough, so back to the AH I went, looking for rings and necks, this time thinking I’d find something I could make on Shoryl. Sure enough, I came away with the knowledge to make some 450 items there. Still shy, I broke down and made the PvP pants, and that pushed me a couple of points over.

Gems and enchants followed – the best I could come up with from my toons, which meant I didn’t have *every* item enchanted that I should have, but I wasn’t running completely empty.

My First Mists Heroics

Then Tyledres and I headed into heroics. Three heroics down, with a noob moment or two on my part (though now I need to remember to turn growl back on on Sionnach before I start doing dailies).  I saw the Pulled Grenade Pin drop in the Gate of the Setting Sun, but the rogue won that. I did, however, come away with a couple of quest upgrades and a couple of drops, so I’m quite happy.

Gate of the Setting Sun was interesting. Tyledres accidentally started the first boss fight while the healer, the gnome (mage?) and I were still outside the room.  While the fight was really long with just a rogue and the tank inside, I could tell we had a good group. When he did Sabotage to one of the three of us outside the room, we would space ourselves so that only one of us took damage, and then the healer healed us back up to full. I suspect some of the success there was I got hit with Sabotage probably eight times in the fight.  The healer keeping all three of us alive meant that those inside didn’t have to worry as much about that damage.  After that everything went smoothly, though (as is typical for me) I died to junk on the ground trying to keep up with the group.

Our healer stuck around for the next dungeon, which turned out to be Scarlet Halls. We had a wipe on our first attempt on Armsmaster Harlan. I died to the first whirlwind, which probably contributed, what with dirt naps causiong a 100% reduction in DPS. I picked up an upgrade via quest reward here.

The final dungeon we did was Siege of Niuzau Temple.  This one was by far the trickiest for me. I died a couple of times, and had to follow other people’s examples to figure out what I was supposed to do on General Pa’valak. When we were finished, I hadn’t realized that I’d not finished the quest Somewhere Inside. So Tyledres and I tromped around the area to find the imprisoned Shado-Pan, which included a bit of killing things. Who needs a healer anyway? (Well, for trash… I sure do on bosses!)  Niuzau was definitely the richest for me, with two upgrades from the bosses and one from a quest.

After I turned in the quest, we sat around and showed off our rarer mounts, and I grabbed a quick screenshot of the two of us on our Winterspring Frostsabers.

Nice Kitty

Achievements

I (obviously) picked up the achievements for completing all three dungeons, but I also picked up a couple more, which were exciting. We got Bomberman in Gate of the Setting Sun; and in Siege of Niuzau Temple, we picked up both Where’s My Air Support and Return to Sender. Those tell me that we just had awesome groups for those runs.  Personally, I also picked up Looking For More; Cataclysmically Superior and Superior. Not bad for a toon who never really got much dungeon love.

Also Coming Back – LBDs!

I’ll be going back to running the Laid Back Dungeons on Wednesdays starting tomorrow!  As we have done in the past, we’ll pick something fun that has a little bit of use for at least one person. It may even be Pandaria Heroics or Scenarios if that’s what the group is interested in. We’ll start at 6:00 Central Time with whomever happens to be on, no need to be there for the whole thing, you can pick up or drop whenever you’d like. We won’t run past 8:30, so I can do silly things like get the dishes done.

The Light, the Dark, and Lady Vashj

Laid Back

Laid Back Dungeons ended up being a laid back raid instead last week. I wasn’t in the mood for current content; and am looking for only a few more pieces for my sword set for Gurdrid. Since she’s carrying a sword right now, it seems to be a good one to work on.

So Tyledres and Gurdrid stormed Serpentshrine Cavern. Hydross went down with almost no sploosh.  The Lurker Below was dead fish pretty easily. Leotheras the Blind became Leotheras the dead.  And then there was Fathom-Lord Karathas. Who killed Gurdrid, but not Tyledres. Much like the last time I was in SSC, where the raid killed him, but the tank died.  After the Fathom-Lord, Morogrim Tidewalker was a walk in the pond. I don’t think we really needed to clear out his murloc minions first.

We were then at Lady Vashj, who has an annoying mechanic in phase two, where you have to pick things up off of mobs that have to be killed really fast.  But we were one-shotting mobs, shouldn’t be a problem, right? Until the fear-masters (Coilfang Striders) came along and feared us all over the place. We attempted twice, the second time trying to ignore one side of the room so that we could get to the tainted cores faster; to no avail. Lady Vashj may have won, but next time I’m bringing a shadow priest with me.

Site Update

I think the site update is pretty well completed. Widgets are in, and I’m pretty happy. I have a page to write for the guild; but otherwise, I’m pretty satisfied with my new look.  The blog name got shortened because of spacing issues. Now that little grey bar makes so much more sense. Also, the subtitle is more readable.

I’ll be trying to continue to work on my blogroll. I added both the Amateur and the Godmother to the page this evening.

I know I haven’t been the best at blogging recently; this is due in varying degrees to the site redesign; being at once too busy and not busy enough at work (it’s odd, I know); and an utter and complete adoration of Mists of Pandaria – so much so that I want to be playing, not writing. Also, there’s laziness and procrastination.

Friends, Dungeons, and Drakes (oh my!)

Last night’s LBD started with three of us: Tyledres, Magik and myself. Since finishing off the Occulus for me, Tyledres and I have been making regular trips to Violet Hold, and never managed to see Hydross. This time, however, we were rewarded with the boss at the first opportunity. Quite exciting! We’d decided beforehand that Magik was going to handle the crystals, since he’s a caster and all. We kibitzed a bit about when to hit them, and decided on right after Hydross splits. Magik was pretty nervous he was going to stuff it up, as the Frostwolves would say; but he didn’t, and Gurdrid got Dehydration, and her protodrake.

Gurdrid’s a Hero!

When we were done, Flagsworth joined us. I could tease Magik and say that he brought his buddy along so he wouldn’t feel like we were hunting down more achievements just for him, or maybe it was just a guildie having fun, inviting his friend along.  (At this point, I need to mention that it’s all JD’s fault I know these guys.)

We headed next to Gundrak to attempt to get Less-Rabi for both Magik and Flags. Having failed it the last time Magik was along for an LBD, we wanted to make sure we got it right, so we handed out interrupt assignments.  I mentioned that I was going to open with a 3-second silence. I think he was dead in two. At most 4. Anyway, 3 90s and an 89 make short work of that one. Flagsworth mentioned in passing it was too bad we only had four, because he needed Share the Love; but Jelexie was on, and said she’d come to help with that one. So we summoned her when we got to Gal’Darah.  And I went and stood on him. We were terrified, since this is such a random achievement, that even white damaging at 90 would cause a miss; so no one did any damage until Jelexie finally got impaled (tip: if the tank doesn’t start tanking until after they get impaled, it goes a lot faster.) I started to just taunt him as soon as I got impaled.

As Jelexie headed out, Magik thanked her, calling her “Jex”.  Which she likes, so is therefore her new nickname. 🙂

After that one, we headed to Halls of Stone to pick up Abuse the Ooze – again for both Flagsworth and Magik. Strategy was explained, and implemented with perfection. Someone also picked up Brann Spanking New while we were in the Halls… I thought it was Flagsworth, but apparently not (according to the Armory). Sjonnir also dropped his belt for one of my sets.

Magik only had one achievement left, so we headed to Utgarde Pinnacle for a try at The Incredible Hulk. We were a little more nervous about this one, but once again, taunt tanking won the day. We also put a shot in on Skadi, to see if we could get the mount to drop, but alas, we didn’t.

Fancy Drakes

And here’s the four of us: Tyledres and Flagsworth in the back on their Violet Protodrakes, and Magik and me in front on our new Red Protodrakes.

That’s not all for Wrath, though. Should anyone come along who’s still looking to pick up their protodrake, we’ll head back out. If everyone has one, though, we’ll start in on Cataclysm dungeons. So far we’re not quite well geared enough to take on the heroics, but I’m sure with some time, and some upgrades, we’ll get there. (We could totally do it with a healer. Just sayin’.)

Miscellania

I wanted to take a moment to make a few comments before Mists releases on Tuesday (squee!!!), my busy weekend, and, y’know, stuffs.

Of Lists and Goals

I’ve posted as I’ve completed my goals before, but this time, it’s to say that I may not make my final goal. That was to get Mining to 525 (or at least 500) on Kerridwen, having switched alchemy over to Sveala.  She’s gotten to 450, but the busy-ness of the weekend makes me unsure whether I’ll get those last points. Mining in current content on a toon I don’t much care to play is kinda hard. The combined zones don’t help matters, either.  So we’ll see. It is, after all, only 50 points.

I’m pretty proud of myself, though. I got two toons maxed, and four professions to at least 500…

Laid Back Dungeons

I plan to continue the LBD runs on Wednesdays. This Wednesday ( Sept 26) I’m hoping that more people on will mean a shot at finishing up my Glory of the Hero achievement. Of course, it does require a certain water elemental to show his ugly mug.   I’d like at least a threesome for trying to use a bronze drake mount – even at 85 (87?) the drakes just can’t withstand the barrage as well as I’d like.   Call me cautious.  But, if there’s only two of us, we’ll totally try anyhow.

Once that’s done, we may start doing Cata heroics for those interested. It’ll all depend on who’s there and what we’d like to do/get. Gurdrid has some clothes to get from a few Cata normals, as well – though I’m hoping once I hit 90 I’ll be able to solo those. 🙂

A New-ish Blog

Tyledres went and created a blog, pinged back to me here, and I totally missed it. I found it when I looked back at my logs, but I was a little bit surprised!  Anyway, go check out Frost and Claws. I’m glad we’ve been here to support her challenging herself to stop worrying and start doing… Now I just need to figure out blogger’s comment system so I can comment already!

(Also, now I’ll have a clue which toon she’s on, so I can actually properly name them in the LBD runs!)

Carefully Then Quickly

Last night, Tyledres (on her mage) and I were back at the Laid Back Dungeons, and got Gurdrid down to only needing two more for the Red Drake, for which I’m very excited.

We successfully completed Zombiefest, even though I died once on trash before the first boss. I’m not sure what happened there, because I was fine, and then I wasn’t.  Her mage picked up both Zombiefest and the heroic Culling of Stratholme achievements; which was a nice bonus.

Then we headed into the Oculus, where we swapped positions from our previous run and she rode the green drake while I rode the red (I needed red marked off for Experienced Drake Rider).  That looked at first like it was going to go off without a hitch, then an odd bug had Tyl stuck on a platform, her mount unable to move, and her unable to find the dismount button. She logged out and back in, and it fixed the problem; but I was pretty sure at that point we weren’t going to make the speed run (which we were only half-heartedly working on).  I wasn’t sure only two of us would have the firepower to get Eregos down quickly, because really, it’s still a little bit challenging, even if you can kill him once you’re on your feet.  We did, however, have a flawless kill, and much to my surprise, picked up Make It Count.

So Gurdrid is down to just two achievements to go, one of which is completing Experienced Drake Rider by riding a bronze drake; and the other is Dehydrated.  I fear the last is going to be my bane.   To be honest, I’d love it if we could pick up a few more regulars to the runs. Having more than two of us will both speed up the runs, and make it easier to have one of us on a bronze drake in Oculus.

Gurdrid also picked up some alternate (much more boring) shoulders for her Dragon Sword set – she still wants Hydross to drop his shoulders, because they’re significantly better.

Client Boss Soloed – Impales Imminent

I will admit, I was a little surprised when 6:30 rolled around and my current favorite Death Knight (no offense, Maurice, or Morai!) was nowhere to be found.   Magik arrived on the scene, and we were just getting ready to head into Azjol-Nerub to work on his red drake some when Tyledres made it online.  Apparently, she was having client problems.    That gave us 3 of the needed five to complete Share the Love.  We started into Azjol-Nerub, deftly completing the entire fleet of achievements (Magik needed Hadronox Denied and Watch Him Die). Meanwhile, Magik and Tyl looked for folks to join us, and I put another call out over RealID.

We were joined by Hottotemseks from Tyl’s guild, and decided that since Sonaira had said she would join us if we needed a fifth, but she was out getting stuff for our lunches, we’d hit up Violet Hold and see if we could get an Ichoron spawn. No luck, but by the time we were done, Sona was on and ready.

Off to Gundrak we went; picking up Snakes, Why’d it Have to Be Snakes for Hott, but missing on Less-Rabi for Magik. We’ll have to be more coordinated in our interrupts on that one for a future attempt.  It took a bit for us to get everyone impaled. It seems that he doesn’t like to impale the one with aggro, so it was handy that we had two tanks for the fight. Afterwards, I actually remembered to get a screenshot, so here’s the gang. If you can’t read the names, Tyledres is on the left, Hott is sporting his drake on the right, Magik is on the white hippogryph in the back, and Sonaira and Gurdrid are sporting the Cenarion Hippogryphs in the center.

Cheers, Tyledres!