Friday, February 17, 2012

Scattershot

Over the last two weeks my usual play style has been just that - scattershot (forgive the hunter pun, but that is my main). I did do some leveling on my shaman and ran the holiday boss daily on my 85s, but the majority of my time has been in LFR. As some of my characters approach the last of the upgrades available, my shadow priest is now geared enough to start the last three heroics. With a few more items, my warlock will be up there as well.

Loot list to date:

Hunter - all tier pieces, belt, boots, one trinket
Deathknight - tier shoulders (DPS and tank), tier chest (tank), belt (DPS), two rings (DPS), 2h weapon (tank)
Rogue - tier chest and pants, non-tier shoulders, both trinkets, axe, dagger, ranged
Mage -  3 tier (helm, shoulders, chest), gloves, belt, boots
Druid - 3 tier (chest, legs, gloves) and belt

The grand totals (starting with the characters in LFR longest to least):

Hunter - 8
Deathknight - 7
Rogue - 8
Mage - 6
Druid - 4

That's 33 pieces of gear from drops in LFR. I only roll need on items that I want, I do not roll need on items I have to trade. I either pass on the tier stuff I can't use or roll to D/E the items that allow that selection. Even in the current climate of LFR folks needing on everything, it is still possible to gear up without behaving like the basest among the pugs.

Most of the LFR runs have gone smoothly, although now that the majority of the people there are either on alts or are new to LFR the quality of the run can vary on any day. It used to be that the "real" raiders ran the first two days of the lockout, and quality steadily declined throughout the week to the point that the last day of the lockout was almost guaranteed to be a fail run. At this point, I've had fail runs on the first day and good runs towards the end of the lockout. Usually the failure occurs during the second half of the raid; I've yet to not make it through the first four bosses.

The only problems that I have seen on the first half of the raid have been people issues. By people I mean asshats. Normally I just ignore the idiots, both literally and using the in-game feature. The last one really got under my skin. I rarely vote to kick someone if the boss dies and they aren't acting like an idiot. This guy, however, was a total asshat the entire run. Aside from being a tool in raid chat, he went AFK during the next to last boss fight. He followed that up by keeping the raid in combat by starting the trash on Hagara and then starting the Hagara fight so he could not be kicked. He was immediately killed by Hagara, so he also contributed nothing to that fight as well. I used the in-game tool to report his behavior. I was so fed up with his antics, in fact, that I created a character on his server and sent a letter to his (former) guild leader to let him know what kind of person he had in his guild. I see that he is no longer in the guild, perhaps he'll play a little nicer with others from now on. AƱklebiter of Alterac mountains, welcome to my asshat hall of shame.

The second half of the raid is where most of the problems occur. I have zoned in to a wipe in progress on the trash before Utraxion, and have wiped repeatedly because the tanks don't know the fight. As in saying "I don't know the fight" after wiping the first time. Usually it takes two or three wipes before they either learn the fight or leave/get kicked. The second fight usually always goes well. Last night was a prime example of the problems on the spine fight. I think we had two amalgs up the entire time because people just wouldn't listen to instructions. I was surprised that we actually got it down. I didn't think we could get madness down, and I was correct. I don't know exactly where the raid failed, because I died on Alexstaza's platform and couldn't see what was happening on the last one. My guess is that people weren't killing the adds and single-targeting the tendrils. At the start of the fight, one of the heals D/C'd. Another one died on the same platform as me. Four druids in the raid and not a single battle rez. It was late, so I dropped group, repaired, and logged out.

The most fun last week was a fun run on my main with a few guildies. We beat up Karazhan first, then took down Blackwing Lair. I finally had my Classic Raider achievement!

10x85:
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 80
Paladin 73
Shaman 62

Friday, February 3, 2012

Progress

I did make a little progress on my 10x85 project. The lunar holiday provided some XP, but it got a bit tedious after doing my two lowbies that could fly. I only bothered to hit the elders that were in the area I was questing in on my non-flying shaman. I managed to figure out a decent rotation on my warrior, and tore up quests in Sholozar and then Icrecrown. The last bit flew by, as I was decked out Cataclysm greens that I farmed up specifically for these last three toons. I was two and three hitting the mobs, managing to get from 79 to 80 faster than I thought I would.

I looked on the auction house for the Cataclysm greens first, but the prices were way too high. I logged onto my deathknight, and tried a few spots. I eventually settled on Mount Hyjal, specifically Ascendant's Rise. The mobs there dropped tons of 77-79 greens along with gold and cloth. When I cleared out the area, I flew around the general area picking up some ore. I continued the pattern until my bags were full. Hearth, sell the junk, fill up the guild bank, repeat. I managed to sell the cloth, leather, and INT plate on the auction house for a tidy profit. I also picked up enough gear to outfit my paladin and shaman when they hit the 77-79 range.

With the raid lockout reset on Tuesday, I went back into LFR. I went on my druid first, and managed to pick up a set of gloves for my restro spec. The raid fell apart before Deathwing. I made out better on my mage, picking up tier shoulders on the first half and non-tier gloves and boots on the second half. Last night I only managed to pick up a set of shoulders for my tank spec on my deathknight. The run finished quickly, so I popped into a random dungeon and smacked Benedictus around a bit. I was putting out some pretty slick DPS on that run, with the next closest being the paladin tank about 10k behind me. I use the meter to see how I'm doing on the run; I can't stand those who start crap about DPS when stuff is dropping like flies. It was a quick run, so I hopped back on my druid to see if I could get Deathwing down. The only LFR that popped was starting on the first boss, but I had nothing better to do. I should have just logged off, as the group I was in couldn't get past the trash.

10x85
Hunter 85
Deathknight 85
Rogue 85
Priest 85
Mage 85
Druid 85
Warlock 85
Warrior 80
Paladin 73
Shaman 54