By the end of wrath I had become a GM. The end of the expansion marked for us the end of ICC… but we still loved going there, getting more people their kingslayer, still going in there for trinkets. We raided pretty much until the week before Cata hit.

Now we are in a new server, done with normal modes and even a heroic. Everyone seems tired of raiding and most of us continue to play to make sure people get their legendaries.

I am not sure if it is the fact that we are better now and conquering the normal mode feels like a completion to some (we had a tank quit the day he got kingslayer back in the day…) or simply that this expansion just took the air out of playing the actual game for most people.

I have always hated questing and by association leveling. I level mostly via PvP and dungeons. I don’t have a desire to take a toon from 0-90… even though I do want a Panda Monk. Am I finally WoW unstuck?

I still enjoy raiding and would love to go back and complete heroic modes in Firelands, but most people want to either play an alt and do the latest and greatest thing. Only those still completing quests in there are really interested, and it seems that everyone runs for the hills when we bring my ever hated raid up.

We have a healthy level of membership right now, but it keeps us at about 15 people logged during prime time but not the same people. I think we are actually hovering around 30 people that play with us… but it makes it hard to plan for MoP. Do we stay 10, do we prepare for 25 just in case that becomes more fun?

I thought I hated 25s after ICC, but 10 has just as many issues. Less people does not mean more issues, it just means that they are amplified. Someone does not show up in a key role, your raid crumbles. 25 seems more forgiving in that sense.

I am almost ready to rate Cata, and for all the good it brought, it also made the bad shine even brighter. I am not done with WoW just yet, but I do think that Pandaland will make or break the game.

I am almost more excited about Diablo than MoP… but that could change as MoP gets closer.

Having killed Deahtwing and working on Legendaries has made raiding less of a focus and given room to alts for my guildies and PvP for me. I still suck a PvP but I have been fun with my tank build and being a flag carrier. 2s and 3s are still about 50/50 depending on the composition.

In the coming weeks we are going to continue to farm DS regular to complete our Legendaries and probably introduce a lot more fun runs like we have been having going through previous tiers. There are still more achievements that we need to get.

Dig the Female panderian and all the scenery I have seen leaked. I am very excited about everything I am hearing so far. It looks like tons of fun are coming and probably sooner rather than later. Diablo 3 its not just soon anymore but May 15!

This will be a great gaming year!

So the challenge rules say:

1.Go into your image folder
2.Open the sixth sub-folder and choose the sixth image.
3.Publish the image! (and a few words wouldn’t hurt, though I dare say I couldn’t stop a blogger from adding a few words of their own).
4.Challenge six new bloggers.
5.Link to them.

But I am not one to play by the rules… so lets see what I can come up with. I really don’t have subfolder for my WoW pictures, they just all stay there in the same place. I might have to start doing some sorting because it is getting pretty huge.

Here is the Sixth picture!

That was from our last guild meeting. It is inside of a little bar you just have to find

As soon as the meeting ended we started a bar fight and found out that you CAN puke while you are turned into a bunny. Fun times!

Now six people to challenge…

Kesith
Cymre
MD Gibbons
Keyel
Liore
and Grumpy

Here is the Raid Code.

-N+/-H+ Difficulty Mode
-N Looking to just see some fights
N Don’t have to complete Normal but would like to try
N+ Looking to complete normal Mode
-H some hardmodes
H most hardmodes
H+ have to complete

-A+ Achievements
-A Not interested
A Don’t mind doing some
A+ Want the mount

10w-500w Wipe threshold
How many times are you willing to wipe before a boss dies

Dr Dk Pa Pr Rg Wr Wl Ma Sm Hn Wl Wr – Class you raid with (HTD) Roles willing/competent at a raid level – Spec if not obvious

1h-10h
Hours willing/able to raid a day

1d-7d
Days willing/able to raid a week

Brag – Latest Raid completed achieved while current content

My Raidercode
-H A 100w Pr(H)D Wr(T) 4h 2d DS-8/8N

Furthermore, what about running a raid with all of the WoW bloggers I read?

While there is the little caviat of me not having a horde character… which might have to be fixed by me rolling a DK and gearing them up. All of my alliance brothers and I could get together and do an awesome Firelands 25 or an LFR together in the not too distant future!

So my dream is to be raiding with people all over the world of warcraft! I cannot wait for this feature to come out.

The first one is that the feature that I have been using very moderately because I did not want to get sucked into it and then have to pay for it (the cross realm party system) just got “released” and it is still free. What is even more interesting is that they are not shying away from the idea that raids could be in the future.

The other feature that is going to be released is the ability to wear cosmetic armor rather than what you currently have on… this is really cool, this could really help me clean up my bank, this could change the way we look at the game.

Since my tanks are already pretty geared I have not been bothered with bringing up my next one… but now with the hotfix that threat is now 500% of damage… well… it makes tanking that much more appealing. I can concentrate on movement and cooldowns now.

And last but not least… it seems that 4.3 is going to bring the raid where I can kill deathwing… as uninterested as I have been about it… this might make me just stay playing until I can complete that and kill that pesky dragon for turning me into a ball of fire while I was leveling an alt in the highlands… dam you blizzard, dam you

I am getting pretty decent at tanking on him, and I enjoy that they are pretty easy to play but you have a batman size toolbelt to play them. Most of the randoms I play with him are quick en enjoyable. I also go and PvP with him when I do log on him.

After a dungeon and a horrible WG I decided to mine and do one more random, and Mangofruit from Maelstrom ques up as a healer. I was first a little concerned that he was in Shadowform, but since he was 80 I figured he was just going to have some fun. Oh no… he pretty much wanted to power through every dungeon we did. 49% of the DPS and all the heals later I got 1.5 levels and almost to 80. Anubis (a hunter that also stuck with us) is trying to get me killed right now since I put myself on follow while I wrote this! lol

So, thank you MANGO! It has been a nice fun run away from Cata heroics! Thanks for the fun!

We are pretty much done with this expansion and most people show up to our 25s to collect loot. After the easy stuff is done they all have to work, sleep, etc. Even if the night before and the night after they still sit in Dalaran doing nothing it seems that our 25 night makes everyone allergic after we clear 6 bosses.

I get it though, running a 25 is like taking a picture of 25 hungry monkeys. Unless you are all super focused it can take up to 3 hours to clear even “easy” content. Nothing wrong with that, but when it comes time to do the harder bosses nobody wants to continue or extend the raid lockout. 80% of the people are ok with just farming gear, but 20% are not. Those people are the ones that have seen that fight in the 100s of times. 10 mans will make all of these issues in a casual guild go away. We can still have some progression minded people running 10 mans week after week and getting further, as well as having the casual enjoy the content that has already become farmable.

Trying to fill up a raid with 10 raiders, 10 casual and 5 pugs can lead you to clear 6 bosses easy, but it could also leave you with some pissed off people saved to 2 bosses on 25… and OMG losing on emblems is a “huge” deal.

I also see the frustration of some of the people that have been doing ICC since it came out but have not been able to complete their set because we have only attempted the end wing bosses and not downed them. It takes practice and we are not doing it every single week, its more like every other week on 25.

However, our 10 man are doing awesome. We should have group 3 and 4 of kingslayers soon. We have about 4 10 mans running now with some hardmodes sprinkled in between. Its just a lot easier to get 10 people on the same page than it does 25. Also most people seem supper interested on getting Kingslayer quick since the achievement seems to be rumored to be going away… while I doubt that, it does seem that for the goals of our guild which is to primarily see all content we are doing better than expected!

While boss encounters, like the LK fight, have a lot of challenging mechanics that require a high level of team play and people knowing what to do; PvP is all of that in a short burst. You first have to see what the other team is going to bring and in seconds come up with a strategy. Then if it does not work (because the healer is just not running out of mana, or another player seems weaker) you switch strategies on the fly.

I am kind of late on this Arena season and have learned a lot. I recommend that if you plan on doing it start getting your experience now so that you don’t feel like a total noob when the next season is out.

I am playing only with my warrior and going arms and I have the good luck to play with all different classes in our teams, from a resto druid to a ret pally we have tons of fun winning. I even almost got the winning streak achievement the other day, but as you rating gets better so does the competition.

If you are interested on starting out, PvP gear is a must! Its the difference between making it lots of fun and frustrating. BGs and WG should get you the starting gear… or maybe you can spend some of those emblems you have no clue what to do with.

If you have a hunter check out Cata’s new camouflage ability, it makes me almost want to roll one… almost!

Then the holiday weekend happened and we decided to start a full clear on that Tuesday to see if we could get back to Lich King fight with a single group. With only one replacement we were able to get a 3 hour 11/12 in ICC 10. It was a pretty cool thing to accomplish, but it was just the beginning.

We gave it some attempts with that group, but we really wanted to start working on it when everyone was fresh. For the next 10 days we had probably about 20 different people on the fight. Mime, Froto, Moondust, Drago, Cybrook all played the hunter role in the fight. Kabara, Chaudara, Unknown, Lyrics, Kiree, Theydrin, Booty, Zeal and others also took turns at the DPS. Sab, Fara, Mumbles, Sylei and myself took turns at healing. Last but not least, Achilles, Phaetel, Death and Arthren all took turn at the tanking. I know with confidence that the first two phases of the fight are pretty burned into everyone’s mind that had attempts with us. The third phase, well, we will get to that later.

For the purpose of talking about our kill I will simplify things by talking about 3 actual phases and two transition ones. They all get less challenging as you start working on them, but they are all very complex and just one new person to the fight can spell huge trouble.

From the first phase this fight separates itself from the rest of icecrown. There are a lot of things going on, but you have to get into a nice grove or you will be dead before all the adds have even spawned. The tanking is key to this part, but you also need solid healers or you will not make it to the first transition phase. The thing that actually was a huge hinderance to this part of the fight was actually the 15% – 20% buff. You see, you have to manage your DPS during this fight or you will be left with too many adds. You have to make sure that nobody kills the easy to down adds or the disease will not jump from mob to mob. (if you are confused you can read a strategy guide to kill Arthras, or read our forums where our start is posted)

Then the transition to 1.5 can also be very tricky and at first will feel like a full phase, but than as you get into the groove you will see that this is more of a mana up phase than anything else. Healing becomes secondary and Tanks and DPS really shine making sure the additional adds get picked up and focused fire down so they don’t kill the raid. Once over (and it is timed) you are left with some adds to deal with and running in while dodging exploding presents.

Phase 2 is probably the most frustrating phase because if everyone is doing their job its not all that difficult, but one mistake by a single player can end your attempt. This is what happened to us over and over, we would start the phase very well, but then we will have defiles all over the place and will get a stranded DPS or a healer picked up by a valk too close to the edge. This one is simply a practice and you will get it phase, but it takes time to get to it. If you have new people in the raid you will be stuck in the transition phase or in this phase for some time… and the people that have been there are not getting to practice the last transition and last phase which is actually challenging.

Once people can get past the defile and correct positioning you seem to get past this phase quickly. Having the right amount of range DPS will help quite a bit during this part of the fight. Having a lock and hunter also does not hurt at all. You spread out, and watch for defile and valks, time everything correctly (even for the unlucky situations) and you are golden.

The last transition phase is what I think makes it almost impossible to “one shot” this with a fresh player. You have to be aware of where the whole raid is and get to your position while dodging defiles on the ground. It is very easy to try to run out on the side opposite of your raid which will mean you are dead if it is the way that the adds are being faced or you are low on health. While it is easy to say that the tanks can control everything in this phase, this along with defile makes it that everyone on your team has to be on their game.

The last phase of the fight is probably the most fun but the one that you don’t get to practice much on. Once we has spend a couple of nights of attempts getting to it consistently I knew the kill was not far away. We put the group together for the kill based on who was available and conquered the fight as a true team. There is definitely a little bit of luck to the last phase; but it all comes down to teamwork and doing your job one player down (someone is going into the sword periodically).

In the end we were left with all healers being responsible for 33% of the healing, which was amazing. The DPS was also pretty evenly spread out and we all made it to the very last phase. We worked hard on it, from refining our strategy to teaching several people the fight from beginning to end. It was an amazing accomplishment that I certainly loved actually leading not just the kill but several of the unsuccessful attempts… we actually “beat the game!” even if it was with an extra buff it still feels awesome to wear the Kingslayer title. Now we just have to do it over and over again so the rest of the people that helped us get to it can also be proud to actual finish current content. Thanks again for all your help and hard work.