A Hunter's Story

Happy Labor Day!

Might tell you ’bout the fun we had w/ the nephew if I get a chance, because he was fun, but regardless, I hope you had a great day today!

Sad to say, I’m not all that exited about Ahune anymore. The problem, imho, is that Bliz is putting most of their focus on the expansion, as is to be expected. So they didn’t really upgrade the fight to be a level 80 heroic battle. Instead, it feels more like a level 70 that they gave extra HP and called him 80. I remember actually having to take out the ads quick, going through more than just one cycle of his two phases, clearing trash that leads up to him, and so on. And I remember it well because we ran it literally 10 times a night, for the two weeks of the festival, just hoping to get an awesome pet. Yet we never even saw it drop… After hundreds of tries.

Now, the way its setup, you zone right to the boss and kill one meaningless mob, then do the boss fight. In the 3 times I did it the other night, we only barely dipped into Phase 1 for the second time once. The rest of the time we downed him in his first Phase 2. And that was it. (Well, we did wipe once, because the group had literally never done it before and didn’t bother to ask about the mechanics at all, so they’re all trying to mele the boss, which is basically insta-kill, so it was just Lady X & I doing anything useful). But anyway, it’s a quick like 2 minute fight and you’re done. He drops a little bag and you’re done for the night. There you go, that’s your one shot per day at a dinky pet (yes, of course I still want the pet, he’s just not nearly as cool as the scorchling, lol). So that’s why I’m disappointed. I’m used to 2 weeks of hammering at this guy with all of our alts and dualboxing to get as many tries as possible. Instead, it’s a 2 minute fight and its over. /sigh

Woohoo! Fire Festival! I personally think it’s a really cool holiday. For a variety of reasons. First, is that Bliz is actually encouraging everyone to play with fire; I just think that’s a little funny. But I also enjoy tossing the torches, running to all the cities and seeing parts of the world I rarely visit, running into the Horde cities, and so on! Of course, there’s also the other reason – leveling. It’s the perfect way to level an alt. You get a ridiculous amount of XP from doing the dailies and hitting all of the fires. Yes, there’s a bit of time involved, but especially with the changes so that you can get mounts at lower levels? I suggest grabbing an alt and having some fun. Don’t forget to bring your heirloom pieces for the XP bonus too! And I’d give you detailed maps on where all the fires are, but… Well, here’s my version of explicit directions: Go to WowHead, look at the achievement you’re working on for that area, and read the comments. Lol.

Meant to put up some comments on Apothecary Hummel, the Love Holiday boss, but in case you couldn’t guess, I’ve been a bit busy lately. Anyway, here are some tips, in case you’re like us and run this about 8 or 9 times each night trying to get the rocket or the pet. Because I don’t know about you, but both of those are pretty sweet! Of course, we have yet to see the rocket drop, and the pet has only appeared twice. I still have hope though! Maybe I’ll get to blog about winning the roll on the rocket!!! Or I can keep dreaming…

Ok, first tip. Healer – stand on top of the fountain in the middle. It gets you up where you can see, and you seem to have less stuff thrown at you. Not required, but it’s kinda fun and somewhat useful. Next tip is kill order: Purple -> Frye -> Green. You don’t have to follow that order, but we’ve found it the most effective in general. The reason is the purple/green part. Tank 1 (anyone can tank by the way) stays on purple, tank 2 (again, anyone – we typically use a hunter dps pet, actually) stays on green. If you’re getting hit (or standing in) purple, use the purple flask. If you’re getting hit (or standing in) green, use the green flask. So then everyone just dps’ down in the kill order. The tip for the tanks is to keep their target pointed towards the wall so that they don’t spray the group with both colors at the same time. Frye will toss up big circles of both color, so that can’t be avoided. He also can’t be tanked because he hates everyone equally.

So to recap:

• green green green OR purple purple purple. Don’t mix them or you’ll take 3k dmg per tick.
• Kill Purple -> Frye -> Green – that takes out one color, then the guy who does both, and leaves you with just one color to worry about in the end.
• Anyone can tank, as long as they’re using the right color.
• Healer should stand on the top of the fountain.
• Use the summoning stone to get all your alts over before you start the fight so you have quick turnaround and get in your maximum shots.

Now GO, FIGHT, WIN!!!

Ok, so if you’re running a dungeon like Halls of Stone, you can make the dungeon go a lot faster by skipping Krystallus and Maiden of Grief. Perfectly fine with that…. So long as you mention that it’s your plan at the beginning of the dungeon (or, hell, even just plain mention it – don’t just do it without saying anything). And if everyone’s good with it. But when the tank is the only one who wants to do that? When the healer & 2 dps want to finish a specific achievement and quickly talk to Yarauk… And the other dps wants all the bosses for the badges… Let’s put it this way – I was the healer, and Lady X was one of the dps. We both needed that one last Elder for the meta.

So, we are in HoS, and tank goes straight to the Tribunal of Ages. We figure it’s fine with us skipping the other bosses, so long as we get that last Elder. Especially since it’s only a couple trash pulls towards Krystallus, and is real quick to get to. So after Tribunal, we are running back to the intersection and mention that we’d like the Elder. The tank is already pulling the trash at the entrance to Sjonnir. So of course someone accidentally pulls other trash on the way to catch up to the tank. And yet the tank doesn’t even try to pull the trash off them, even though I managed to heal us through all that. Oy! But anyway, then we got into a debate with the tank, because 3 of us were sitting over by the area to get the Elder, and 2 of them were sitting by Sjonnir. Tank was giving the “I don’t have time, I have a raid” excuse and saying that we can just queue up for a tank after we kill Sjonnir. I’m sorry, but isn’t that a bit rude for the incoming tank (assuming we got one who clicked OK when they saw 2 of the bosses were already down – one of which being the final one)? The incoming tank wouldn’t be able to get Frosts for the random, or even any good number of badges. Not to mention the half hour we’d have to wait for a tank anyway, since I’m guessing most tanks won’t accept a dungeon that’s already complete… So we pretty much just plant ourselves. I mean seriously, it’s like 3-4 pulls, AoE, and they go quick. And 3 people in the group of 5 want to do it, 1 doesn’t care, and only 1 doesn’t want to. So instead, we wound up spending more time talking about it than we would have spent getting the Elder and then the final boss. Finally the tank does the “Well you can always just get another tank ” and ditches. Which was fine with us, we just invited a guildie and actually finished out the whole dungeon. But he needed a Rose anyway, so it worked out pretty well, lol.

But my point here is that people should play nicer. If you plan to do something in the dungeon that is different from the norm (such as skipping bosses) then you should ask first. Or mention it. Just say something so people don’t waste their time. For example, when I’m tanking in GD, I always ask if people want Eck or not. And then I go with the majority vote. It doesn’t matter to me if we kill him, I don’t need the badge, but it doesn’t take long. And if I were in a super rush, I’d let people know when we start that I don’t have time for him. And even if I were in a rush, and 3 ppl in the group needed me to do 3 quick trash pulls so they could get a meta… Yes, I would take the time. Because it’s faster to just do it than to discuss it!

And another side note – Tanks and Healers are replaceable in PuG’s. And it doesn’t take too long either, because you jump the queue when you’re mid dungeon and lose someone. Therefore it is not a trump card to say “Do it my way or I’ll leave”. So please realize that it’s an MMO, meaning lots of different people with lots of different expectations, needs, wants, etc. And if you’re in a group of people and the majority of the group needs something real quick? Be nice! Seriously!

WeWt! Violet Drake #2. Last night Lady X & I got the drakes on our first alts. Hard to believe a year ago we were already starting to get all the holiday achievements on these 2 in addition to our mains! Since this char is a Pally, that means I get 20% over the 310% drake for a nice clip at 330% speed!

It’ll certainly be nice to go faster when flying, though the dungeon finder and the fix to summoning stones has made that a little less necessary. But when flying out for the fishing daily or farming and such, it’ll definitely be a help. Just a few more weeks or so until we get it on our second alts. Can’t wait, but at the same time – what will we do during the holidays if we don’t have to run around doing crazy stuff on 3 characters each?!?!