Success in the Face of Failure

Brotherhood of Oblivion: failing where we should succeed, and suceeding where we should fail!

On Thursday night we had two potential recruits listening on vent.  This meant one thing for sure: the night was going to go to hell.

I hummed to myself and made some flower wreaths for the handbasket.

First of all, Tim, one of our intrepid DPSers, had himself a non-working OS because he’s just clever like that.  Cranky Tank mosied over across the street to fix it before raid time…and bricked the mother board.

Slick, my love.

So we’re down a tank, a DPS, and…our other tank, as Steve’s computer is drafted while they try to fix Tim’s.  This leaves us our tank with strength gems in his gear and Andy, who’s been retired from tanking for awhile.

Right, so, no continuing ICC25 for us!  14 manning Naxx25 for the weekly raid quest seems like a splendi…

…Hunt just pulled an extra spider pack and we wiped.  Okay.  Well, let’s recover from that and go on to Anub, shall we?

Anub is easy sauce, it should just be a matter of-

…did we all just die?  We all just fucking died!

Fail.

Well, Steve’s here now, let’s 15 man it, then.  We magically succeed this time, and reform into an ICC 10.  Steve wants to bring his warlock and the warlock wants to bring his shaman.  For some reason I say what the hell, and off we go.

To wipe on Marrowgar.

Well, fuck.  Okay.  So we regroup and stomp him into the ground, and then proceed to…wipe on Lady Deathwhisper after one of the tanks unexpectedly goes down to a Hulk.

(Me, mid raid: are those big green things wearing purple shorts?  Raid: Yes.  Me: …)

So we regroup again, down the Lich Bitch, and head to Gunship!  One of the tanks dies on the way because I paused to eat chocolate.  Mm, chocolate.  Okay, so, we get to gunship and…

…the warlock smears himself on the deck, because that’s what warlocks do.  The DPS left loses control of the adds on that ship, the tank goes down, and we…wipe on Gunship.

We wipe on the mother fucking boat!

This does lead to the amusing discovery that you don’t die if you’re in a cannon.  This comes in handy for when we make our-by this point required-wipe on Saurfang (at something like 4% even).  Yes, I ran the fuck away from the boss to hide in a cannon.  This was after yelling at the rogue and hunter for hiding in the cannons when they can get out of death some other way.  Bitches!  MY WAY TO CHEAT DEATH GTFO.

So after dying our way through farm content, will all sorts of insanity on vent, you’d think the recruits would be smart and run away, right?

…no, they went ahead and transferred.

I invited them in the middle of our third wipe in an all guild Heroic CoS.

Yes, we even failed at H CoS (did you know that if you do the gaunlet without talking to Arthas, talking to him makes more elites spawn?  Yeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaah don’t send your healer). 

I love my guild.  I don’t always know why, but I love them.

80 #3: Huntar!

My hunter was, once upon a time, my most beloved character.  She was even my raiding main for most of BC, only being shelved when the hunter glut made it almost impossible to find a home post guild-asplode. 

I took a lot of pride in learning how to play, thanks to my patient mentor, Olgas.  And now I have to…relearn how to play.  Sans mentor, at least for the BM spec.  Meep!

Mere minutes after dinging, I was invited to the in-progress guild run of Naxx25.  I had remembered to train my 80 skills (Josh didn’t-ha!), but was for the most part unenchanted, ungemmed, scrub hunter with a pet who was…still level 78?  Fuck.  BoA gear to transfer XP bonus to pets, too, imo.

Of course, now she is a scrub hunter with a few epics, so this evening will be dedicated to gemming, enchanting, gear-buying and…running ToC into the ground.  Oh, and leveling my pet.  Silly devilsaur.  THEN I’ll have to turn around and level my wolf because I hate the Northrend wolf models.

I also managed to create loot drama by…trying to be nice.  Oops?  My recommendation is this: don’t do “limitless loot” runs when you have several alts looking for gear plus pugs in a raid.  Someone is going to have hot dice, and then everyone else will, if not be butthurt, at least be making sad faces as they watch a lot of gear go to a rogue who is barely beating said scrub hunter in DPS.  Seriously, I’m 3% from hit cap with a low level pet in a sub par DPS spec and I’M ON YOUR HEELS DPS-WISE WTF GO REROLL.

*coughs*

We’ll ingore the part where I ran out of ammo halfway through the last boss and went melee on Loatheb.

Yeah.  So.  Error in loot rules on our part (Andy, honey, WHY DID YOU NOT USE OUR NORMAL RULES) that will…not be repeated. 

Now I need to go…play with spreadsheets. 

/cower

We have a…pattern.

Random conversation with Josh in Target:

“So, I was talking with Steve at work, and he was wondering if you would go holy again.”
“Fuck no! Has he forgotten that I hated it?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Ha!  Ha!  Hahahahahaha!  Besides, the crack elves would see.  No.”
“The who?”
“Nothing.”

But on to that pattern thing I mentioned in the title.  BoO has one when it comes to boss progression.  I find it funny, myself.

1) Meet new boss.  HI NEW BOSS.
2) Wipe.  And wipe and wipe and wipe.
3) Make MASSIVE PROGRESS!  OMG, we could kill him tonight!
4) On the very next attempt, someone will flub something stupid early on and we wipe quick.
5) Shit goes downhill from there and the raid is called.

Then, the NEXT TIME we walk in there:

1) Hi boss, LOLOLOLOL HERE’S YOUR BALLS BACK WE TAKE LOOT NOW KTHX.

There may be one wipe in there if we shifted too many new people in, but generally, after a day or so off we come back like a fucking freight train.  I’ve seen it happen more than once, the most notable  case being Freya.  She stonewalled us and then a couple of WEEKS later when we finally got back to her, we one shot her.  Bwuh?

Obviously I’ll be posting a Mimiron victory shot after tonight’s raid, yes?  Assuming Atropus remembers that tank +mine = bad…

Razorscale Strat

“Amber, why are you doing Ulduar strats when t9 is out?”
Because some of us slackers aren’t done with Ulduar yet.  STFU!

Basic Concepts:

• Don’t stand in the fucking fire
• Whirlwind eats rogues
• DPS what you’re told WHEN you’re told, mister

It’s a simple fight, all told.  In fact, to new DPS I have already distilled it down to some really simple instructions.

You can add on “Give the tanks time to get aggro on the adds, numbnuts,” if you feel that you really need to.  I, personally, would just slap them around until they got the point, or “lag” at convenient moments, but far be it for me to tell you how to handle your scru…er, DPS.

Moving on.

Tank-wise, this fight requires multiple tanks for both phases.   We actually use two for both 10 and 25 man, with our third 25 man tank lolDPSing until Razor is grounded.  You may want to use all three for adds depending on what you’ve got-but we’ve got a pally and a warrior who pretends he’s a pally, so the DK whined that he was bored.  

Tanks split up the far half of the “room” and tank adds.   Sentinels should not be allowed to play with melee classes and die first.  You don’t need to worry about Razor when she’s grounded by turrets-just handle your adds, or whale on her if you’re free to do so.  When she’s perma-grounded at 50 percent, have a tank pick her up.  Most people kite her around the circle, though in 10s we’ve been lazy and just spun her around some.   When you get 2 stacks of Fused Armor, switch tanks.  If you other tank is on autofollow browsing 4chan, have his girlfriend turn around and smack him.

…wait, that’s just our raids.  Um, just switch at 2 stacks, okay? 

DPSwise, your job is simple.  Don’t stand in the fire.  Kill Sentinels-those are the big guys-first when they spawn.  They whirlwind, so tell your fucking suicidal rogues to stay away.  The casters go next, unless you enjoy the tingly feeling that chain lightning brings.  When the boss is grounded, switch from adds (if they’re up) to the boss.  One of you is going to be the turret bitch-suck it up and deal.  When all turrets (2 for 10man, 4 for 25) are ready and your leader says go, bring her down.  When she’s grounded, I don’t recommend you get in front of her.

Healers, same old same old here for us.  Have one healer per tank during phase one, and drop down to one or two healers on whoever has aggro for phase two.  Feel free to bitch at a resident pally for wis on the boss and wand/smack her while she’s grounded.  Let the idiots who stand in the fire die.  If the rogues are nice to you, bubble them when adds spawn, because they’ll run for the Sentinels and give them a hug.  I don’t bubble our rogues because I like seeing them all die at once, though. 

Pew pew, collect loot, done.

Letters from Ulduar

Dear ___: Open Letters To My Guild Mates, or Why Amber Goes Insane

Dear DPS on Iron Council,

Don’t stand over there.  I can’t heal you.  I kind of need to stand near my tank, and my tank kind of needs to stand over here.

Okay, so you’re now standing in such a way that my green box is lit up.  I can heal you and you can stop bitching about not getting heals.  Cool!  …do you wanna come closer for Power Infusion? 

Sometimes we’re kinda busy, and when dickhead over there refuses to move out of the blue circle and starts shitting lightning everywhere, it’s…well…ouchy.  But our holy priest has this nifty thing called a lightwell!  It’s sitting right there!  …why is the holy pally the only one near it?

…I still can’t reach you with PI, you know.  Oh well, your DPS loss.  I’ll keep it for myself.

…why the fuck are you all the way on the opposite side of the room again?

Weeping silently, on the inside,
-your healer

 

Dear DK Tank,

I’m standing on the left.  You keep running away from Overload (or whatever)…to the right.  WHY?
I have a heart attack every time your box goes gray.

Weeping less silently on the inside now,
-your healer

 

Dear Josh,

My beloved.  You have tanked for me for years.  I am comfortable with your ways.  I know you are a clever, clever tank-one who will use his cooldowns, not run out of range, wait for my mana, and gather up all the adds that love to come give me hugs.

…WHY DID YOU QUIT AND LEAVE ME TO DEAL WITH THESE PEOPLE ALONE?

Is well past weeping and now sobbing,
-your healer*
*this is a post in and of itself

 

Dear GM,

No, I don’t want to heal without replen on Iron Council.
No, I really don’t.
Yes, my mana bar does get kicked in the nuts.
Yes, it is kind of important. 
No, I don’t think that having the Surv hunter go MM to help the DK tank kick that damn boss out of the blue runes will make up for the lack of replen. 
The whole instance is designed ar-
I JUST DON’T WANT TO.
/tantrum

Angrily,
-your healer

 

Dear fellow priest,

Thank you, Ron, for displaying mana regen meters and explaining to Mach why no replen is Bad.  I will refrain from killing people for yet another day.

Love and butterflies,
-the bubble dispenser

 

And last but not least, a tidbit from the Hodir attempts:
“Why the hell did you die like that, Atropus?”
“…oh!  I wasn’t jumping!”
“…”
“I’M BLOGGING THAT.”

Iron Council: How To Save Your Healer’s Sanity (And Mana Bar)

We wiped on Iron Council a lot on Monday.  It’s a fight we’ve done before-but always with my trusty Zoja in the back tanking the smaller bosses. 

This week, we had our DK tank.

Yeah…uh…when we don’t have interrupts back there, the encounter kicks my mana bar in the nuts.  Atropus?  Great guy.  Good tank usually.  Totally not a warrior and totally not interrupting…whoever the fuck back there casts shit.  I mean I know DKs have interrupts.  They’ve used them on me, the fuckers.  Either he didn’t have enough of them, or wasn’t doing them, or something.  Regardless, there was more pain being dished out by…someone doing…something.

Sorry guys, I’m a healer.  I’ll explain this in healer terms, which means I have no idea what the tank is doing back there, specifically.  My world consists of green bars, and knowing that when a blue square appears in the corner of the MT’s box on this particular fight, I need to cleanse it while not letting the OT die.  If there weren’t Falcon Punch jokes flying I wouldn’t even know what that blue square WAS other than “something to be cleansed”. 

But back to the fight.  Without interrupts, there’s more raid damage.  Do you know what happens to me-and the other healers-when there’s that much raid damage?

With Boss #1 down and Boss #2 nearly dead but the fight nowhere near finished, I stand there looking at a bar where everything is dark except for Gift of the Naaru.  Shadowfiend?  On cooldown.  Hymn of Hope?  On cooldown.  Mana pot?  Used.  Mana BAR?  Gone!

Phaseroll has died.
Sidearm has died.
Macharious has died.
Kyrileanthgodwhyisyournamesolong has died.

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUU-

I actually would have kept wiping for the next hour we had slated to raid-there’s nothing saying we couldn’t have made progress on Freya, or something.  Despite my calling Ky crazy for enjoying Monday night, I have no issues with a night of glass chewing.  Even if it’s slightly old, we’ve killed this before glass.  Progress was made-after a fashion…lessons were learned…and the healers had to really push themselves!

…but I totally had to have the bank pay repairs because I was broke!

So…interrupt interrupt interrupt!  I’ll be in the corner sobbing now.

The Blame Game

What I was doing last night.

It’s time for that minigame of minigames that always crops up when raids go south: the blame game.  Only last night, I was in the thick of it.

When push came to shove, raid time rolled around with 4 healers and one DPS shy.  Since we were also sans our ret pally and surv hunter, I put on my shadow hat.  That’s right, I went into Ulduar as DPS.

…it pretty much went to hell.

When I AoE’d, I got adds.  Rogue?  Died to adds.   Zuki?  Died to adds.  I tried to lighten up on the AoE.

“Well Amber, your DPS and Ipwn’s are kinda low.”

…

/mind sears adds

/screams and bolts for the tanks with an add

“Maybe you should heal and let Blacklion DPS.”

…

Posted in our forums under dualspecs:
“Blacklion Main Spec is Resto. Secondary spec is Restokin (Boomkin spec in resto gear) only about 2200 DPS in Boomkin though.”

LOOKIT WHAT I DID IN THAT THERE PUG.

NO.

/mind sears adds

/screams and runs for the tanks with TWO adds

“Let’s go do something else.”

We down XT and then wander back to Razor.  They bitch.  I bitch.  I point out replenishment.  They point out moonkin aura.  I argue that they are not the same.  They suggest change for the sake of change.  I sulk and swap over to disc.

We down Razor, and I soothe myself by thinking that it was my awesome bubbles that were the cause.  Tanking still failed left and right, but I could bubble and penance away the pain before they shed their mortal coils.  Or so I told myself.

Then we go to Ignis, me as disc and nursing wounded pride and…wipe some more because adds wanted to give the healers hugs.

…

Know Thyself

In my little discussion about group composition on our guild forums, I made sure to mention that Atropus and I, while good officers in our own right, should not be left to run a raid together.  At least, not a progression raid.  You can only imagine my reaction when someone in the guild mentioned (well, had dragged out of them) that the Amazing Ron said that any raid the two of us led turned into utter fail.

“LOL”

We’re not strategy minded people.  I can read a strat, and explain it clearly, but when things need tweaking?  Hell if I know just how to tweak it half the time.  My idea of strategy is putting the DPS warrior on turrets to try to keep him from dying (it’s a totally illogical move…unless you know this warrior.  He’s the one that died 21 times in normal Occ, okay?). 

As much as I love working with Atropus, I do hope that Steve decides to split us up.  I know that he prefers working with another seasoned tank.  I love it when two seasoned tanks work together.  But it makes no sense to effectively screw over the second group by having Atropus and I lead it!  ;)

And now some random musings about delving into the dark side:

I got to shadow DPS in Naxx10 last night.  I find the process rather soothing, in a way that playing a Beast Master hunter was not.  While I still have a rotation (or rather, a…priority list), I am not micromanaging my pet.   Not to say I don’t love my hunter still-oh gods, do I-but shadow priests are so…glowy.  

In rearranging my bars to neatly show my spell priority, I put SW:P where my Fade (and every other oh shit button) usually is, which can lead to interesting results when I attract somethings attention.  >.>

I managed to do….2400?ish?  DPS overall, which isn’t terrible for being a scrub.  We go back to finish tonight and I am studying to be less scrub!

I will never abandon being a healer, but damn it is nice to be able to DPS sometimes.

Leadership = Logic Puzzle?

A man has to get a fox, a chicken, and a sack of corn across a river.
He has a rowboat, and it can only carry him and one other thing.
If the fox and the chicken are left together, the fox will eat the chicken.
If the chicken and the corn is left together, the chicken will eat the corn.
How does the man do it?

You need two Ulduar groups.  The following conditions apply:

Warrior Tank 1 (WT1) doesnt’ want to raid without Disc Priest (DP). 
Paladin Tank (PT) wants to tank with WT1.
Death Knight Tank (DT) wants to be in a group with either WT1, DP, or PT.
Warrior Tank 2 (WT2) doesn’t give a shit and has no idea this clusterfuck even exists.
PT will tank with DT if he has to, but does not want to tank with WT2.

…

Following me so far?  If not, don’t worry.  That list above makes my fucking head hurt, because it’s essentially an unsolvable puzzle.

The current groups are:
PT + WT1
DK + WT2 + DP

This violates Condition #1, however, and neither Zoja nor myself are very happy.  While Atropus and I work great together, I have to live with Zoja and listen to him bitch about being in a different group. 

My Proposed Solution:
PT + WT2 + one of the twins that also serve as officers so that he is not the “only” officer in the raid. 
WT1 + DT + DP so that Atropus is raiding with his friends and the couple can continue to function as the pair that they are (did Zoja go AFK without warning?  I’ll will let you know!  Is Zoja alt tabbed looking at 4chan?  I will turn around let him know you’re pulling!  Do we for some reason want to talk to each other?  We can do so without the constant interruption of both vent channels!)  Yes, Zoja and Steve tank GREAT together.  But Zoja and I heal/tank GREAT together.  I’ve been healing him since Molten fucking Core-with NO other tank do I have that instinctive understanding.  Which synergy is more important?

But this violates Condition #5, which exists because…I don’t know, Steve is a dick or something.

Other possibilities:

WT1 + WT2 + DP = why the fuck do we have two warriors in the same group, reducing diversity and also increasing gear competition?

DT + WT2 = why the fuck do we have the two least experienced tanks together?!?!?!  I love them both, don’t get me wrong, but Atropus  is a “new main” and he didn’t tank with his old one.  Wreckz is also a “new main” and while he DID tank on his old toon, pally tanking =/= warrior tanking.  Not a good pairing for progression content.

Also, the Zoja/Josh + Steve pairing seems to conjure in everyone’s minds the idea that their group is the “good” group.   It doesn’t seem to matter that just as many officers are in each group, “clearly” the GM will be in the “best” group, along with his best friend.  Never mind that we have some of the best DPS and some of the best healers, we “must” be the “leftovers” group because “they” aren’t in it.

/headesk

This attitude was emphasized by the fact that group 1 downed the Lootmoble, one shotted Razorscale, and then two shotted XT.  Group 2 downed Lootmobile and proceeded to wipe 6 times on Razorscale until the holy priest DC’d, couldn’t get back in, and we had to call it a night half an hour early.  While I put on my Sunshine Hat and praised everyone for visible improvement on every attempt (true!  We might well have had her if not for the fateful DC), inside I couldn’t help but me a smidge bitter.

Steve seems to think we can compromise by rotating, but rotating is hell on progression.

I…don’t know what to do, to be honest.  My proposed solution is neatly cockblocked by Steve going “But I don’t WANT to tank with Wreckz!”

/facepalms

/bubblehearths

Off to take a more logical version of this to the officer forums!  I just felt like sharing my pain, apparently…

Disc Priest Tips for Razorscale (10 man)

A Disc Priest’s Take on Healing Razorgorescale

First, accept this: you’re going to be running around like a nut.  At this point, you may want to thank the Azerothian gods that you are not a paladin.  I found that the best way not to risk standing in a fire was to…well, not stand anywhere.  I stood still long enough to pennance and then resumed hiking up my skirts and fleeing. 

My Ulduar 10 group’s healers consisted of a holy paladin, myself the disc priest, and a holy priest.  I assigned the holy paladin to tank healing (two tanks + beacon = win), the holy priest to…well, raid heals, and myself?  I knew my best purpose here would be raid…bubbling.

I bubbled myself.  I bubbled the other healers.  I bubbled the tanks.  I bubbled the suicidal melee DPS.  I bubbled the entire fucking raid.  Penance, especially talented and glyphed, is your blessing here.  Did one tank run out of the pally’s range and now teeters on the brink of death?  Dart over and PEW PEW LAZERZ! 

Mage tanking adds?  Bubble and PEW PEW LAZERZ!

DPS warrior hugging a Sentinel?  Bubble and PEW PEW LAZERS!

Naturally if you’re lacking the bacon hax and tank healing yourself, your strategy is going to be a little different.  You’ll still bubble the hell out of the raid, but with two people to focus on the raid, you’ll be saving your penance mostly for the tanks. 

Suggestion for tanks:  Don’t be so eager to tank her that you run in front of her just before she hits 50%.  Because our tank did, and then she did the knock back while we were all still behind her…and…well.

TANK   <——————————-RAZORSCALE————————————>  HEALERS

Can you guess how far our healing range goes?!?!?!

Not that far!

Now…we wiped on her 6 times last night and did not, actually, kill her.  But we totally would have during that 6th attempt if the holy priest hadn’t DC’d and then gotten stuck on the Loading Screen Boss.  >:|

Meanwhile the other Ulduar 10 group one shotted Razor and two shotted Deconstructor (they didn’t realize he had trash the first time…ha…ha…ahaha).

/facepalm