3 26 Pants Tres Bien!
3 26 Pants Tres Bien!
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| The 25-Man Progession team defeats Hodir, earning "Heroic: I Have the Coolest Friends", Ulduar |
Oh, Dear
By the third weekend of raiding Ulduar, we were face-to-face with Hodir. The second of the four keepers, Hodir hid within a refrigerated tomb. An audience of NPCs stood before him, frozen into position -- a reminder of the bitter elements he wielded. Our task was to break the NPCs out of their icy prisons so that they could offer assistance to us in the defeat of their captor. Freeing the NPCs granted us buffs which would accelerate our execution of the frozen giant. We slowly led him around the circumference of the room and I traded off tanking as his Frozen Blows pummeled us. Other mechanics existed and were no less important: runic discs that indicated incoming icicles, the need to constantly move to prevent Biting Cold from stacking -- but freeing the NPCs was a decisive way to turn the tables in our favor.Providing, of course, that our raiders made the breakout a priority.
Well, except for Ben, that is.
In his uniquely adorable fashion, Ben liked to play by his own rules. And even though Cheeseus gave Ben very specific instructions on execution priorities (frozen NPCs / players first, Hodir second), Ben liked to focus all of his damage into the boss, walking away from the kill with a nice record of top DPS. And, as is typical of players whose priority is a spell-rotation rather than the subtle details of ambient incoming damage, Ben fell victim to some falling ice and was killed. So, not only did he not break people out of ice as instructed, his own critically important "top DPS" was quickly 0 DPS, thanks to pushing up daisies while the rest of us dealt with the frost giant. Cheeseus was good at holding his tongue in the raid, but Id be sure to hear about it over IM the next day.
After the excitement of another boss kill died down and the achievement of "Heroic: I Have The Coolest Friends" faded off of our screen, Neps began to solicit bids on the linked loot. One of the items, "Leggings of the Stoneweaver", were a pair of Mail Intellect/Spirit pants, intended for a Restoration Shaman. A few moments after bids started, Neps shot me a whisper.
"Divine is bidding on these."
Ah, God. What the Hell would a Paladin want with Mail Pants?
"He says theyre still an upgrade from what he has."
I scanned the roster. Four Shamans, two of them Restoration. One of them...the Healing Officer Kelden.
"They really ought to go to a Shaman off-spec before a Pally, but whatever. If he insists on bidding..."
There was a bit more silence as Neps completed his whispers back to Divineseal, and then spoke in Vent, "Ok, counting down bids...3...2...1, winner is Divineseal."
Comes the laughter. Divine quickly sprung to defend his bid, "Hey, theyre an upgrade! And you know...you can never tell when you might get an upgrade, right?"
I glanced down at officer chat.
[Officer][Dalans]: What an idiot.
Initially, Freya was untouchable, protected from damage by her "Attuned to Nature" stacks. As the fight progressed, she summoned Snaplashers, Storm Lashers, and Ancient Water Elementals, all of whom did not wish to be friends. As we worked through the kinks of her summoned soldiers, she lost stacks of her attunement buff -- eventually leaving her naked as a noob in the woods. That was the signal, and we burned her to the ground, keeping an eye out for any sprouting Blessings of Eonar; foilage that would heal her if left to grow unchecked. It only took a few attempts to get a feel for the craziness of the add tanking. Once we had that polished, Freya succumbed to the might of the 25-Man progression team. Three guardians down, one to go.
Neps began to take bids on Freyas loot, the first of which were tokens for the Tier 8 legs. One such token was the Legplates of the Wayward Conqueror: potential owners were Priests, Warlocks...and Paladins.
"Closing bids, 5...4...3...2...1," said Neps into Vent, "Winner: Divine".
Wow.
[Officer][Dalans]: Really?
[Officer][Cheeseus]: lol
The ability to exchange loot with players that were present when the loot dropped (for up to 24 hours) was a wonderful feature that Blizzard added to the game, to help us mediate some of this loot drama. Unfortunately, that feature wouldnt be implemented for another three months. So I said nothing, but only shook my head in disappointment, a gesture which ended up being completely lost on a person who was hundreds of miles away.
For a Paladin, he wasnt exactly demonstrating the best judgement.
Mimiron was an intense and complex encounter, split into four different phases. In phase one, Mimiron commandeered a literal tank, a smaller version of Flame Leviathan. Our own figurative tanks had to control it in the center of Mimirons lab, blowing cooldowns to survive Plasma Blast while avoiding ejected mines. Defeating this tank took us to phase two. A gatling gun emerged from the floor, pivoting and blasting us with no uniform pattern to speak of. While healers struggled to keep up with the chaotic damage, Mimiron launched missiles from this gatling gun, painting targets of instant death on the ground. Phase three had Mimiron piloting a miniature aircraft. Safely out of melee, he would require a ranged DPS as a tank -- a throwback to old encounters like High King Maulgar, Illidari Council and Leotheras the Blind. The secret to grounding him came in the from of gravity cores which we farmed off his bot defenses.
Once the raid became accustomed to the nuances of all three of these phases, they would be tested one final time in a fourth phase, in which all three units would re-assemble into a single gigantic robot, employing all of the above mechanics against us at once. All three machines had to be killed again...and all three of them had to be destroyed within seconds of each other. Failing to do so meant each component repairing one another, whittling us away in the process.
I remembered back to similarly complex fights like Lady Vashj and Kaelthas and wondered how many nights of work we would need to put into Mimiron in order to execute a kill. I had my answer within the hour. 45 minutes before the scheduled end time for the Sunday evening raid, a broken and badly beaten 25-Man Progression team limped through the third and final attempt on Mimiron. With only 15 of us alive, the last bit of damage was poured evenly into all three parts of Mimirons gigantic Voltron-style mech, and in one final moment, he twitched, shook, buzzed, and teetered over as his robotic components lost power. "Heroic: The Keepers of Ulduar" was complete, and after three weeks, we were 3/4ths of the way through the instance, earning ourselves another early end to the raid.
Hard mode is gonna suck on this one, I thought. And I couldnt wait.
"Hold on a second," said Neps as the cheering died down, "I think Divines pants are in here somewhere."
Vent lit up with a round of laughter. The ping of a whisper notification caught my eye and I glanced down to my chat window:
[W From][Cheeseus]: We need to talk about Divine after the raid.
I chuckled.
[W To][Cheeseus]: About his supreme lack of sensitivity surrounding loot?
[W From][Cheeseus]: About the fact that hes 7th in healing.
Well. This was a bigger issue than I thought.
Wed only brought six healers to the raid.
Sowing chaos in Ventrilo was easy to do, thanks to the Flash Freeze mechanic. Everyone felt the need to communicate to the team that now was the time to get into the runic discs that lit the floor. Moments earlier, the discs were a death sentence, the destination of an incoming shower of icicles. Now, they were sanctuary, providing the only protection against the entire rooms encasement into ice. And no matter how many times wed remind players there was no need to call it out...they felt the need to call it out.
When raiders dont follow the strategy, you are filled with an urge to backseat raid lead. Like a nervous tick that you repeat subconsciously -- an unchecked addiction. It takes every ounce of energy to keep yourself from picking at the scab, because you know it wont heal...yet you continue to push your nail under the surface, over and over until the wound is raw. When Blain was my raid leader, he was very good at reminding me to stop. He took control of the situation, no matter how much it might offend me, and reminded me to shut the hell up. This isnt your job. Youre not making things better. Id snap back into reality, and apologize. Id stop picking. For the moment.
In the absence of his familiar calls in Vent, I was on the receiving end. Everyone felt like they had to take on the responsibility of notifying the raid exactly when and wear to move. And of course, I wasnt the raid leader, so deferred to Cheeseus to handle. The good news was that Cheeseus and his merry men from Eh Team were already schooled on Hodir; moving appropriately was nearly instinctual for them. The 25-Man progression team saw them in action and learned quickly, proving that they were highly tuned raiders. The raiders did this because of the expectations we had set ahead of time. They knew to listen and follow directions...if they wanted any chance to return to the roster the following week.
Well, except for Ben, that is.
In his uniquely adorable fashion, Ben liked to play by his own rules. And even though Cheeseus gave Ben very specific instructions on execution priorities (frozen NPCs / players first, Hodir second), Ben liked to focus all of his damage into the boss, walking away from the kill with a nice record of top DPS. And, as is typical of players whose priority is a spell-rotation rather than the subtle details of ambient incoming damage, Ben fell victim to some falling ice and was killed. So, not only did he not break people out of ice as instructed, his own critically important "top DPS" was quickly 0 DPS, thanks to pushing up daisies while the rest of us dealt with the frost giant. Cheeseus was good at holding his tongue in the raid, but Id be sure to hear about it over IM the next day.
---
After the excitement of another boss kill died down and the achievement of "Heroic: I Have The Coolest Friends" faded off of our screen, Neps began to solicit bids on the linked loot. One of the items, "Leggings of the Stoneweaver", were a pair of Mail Intellect/Spirit pants, intended for a Restoration Shaman. A few moments after bids started, Neps shot me a whisper.
"Divine is bidding on these."
Ah, God. What the Hell would a Paladin want with Mail Pants?
"He says theyre still an upgrade from what he has."
I scanned the roster. Four Shamans, two of them Restoration. One of them...the Healing Officer Kelden.
"They really ought to go to a Shaman off-spec before a Pally, but whatever. If he insists on bidding..."
There was a bit more silence as Neps completed his whispers back to Divineseal, and then spoke in Vent, "Ok, counting down bids...3...2...1, winner is Divineseal."
Comes the laughter. Divine quickly sprung to defend his bid, "Hey, theyre an upgrade! And you know...you can never tell when you might get an upgrade, right?"
I glanced down at officer chat.
[Officer][Dalans]: What an idiot.
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| The 25-Man Progression team poses after defeating Freya in The Conservator of Life, Ulduar |
Attuned to Nature
We took our leave of that subzero prison, and made our way into a room that was everything Hodirs wasnt. Sunlight bled across a lush forest, pools of water and rich vegetation. The room bore a striking resemblance to Sholazar Basin and Ungoro Crater, known playing grounds of the Titans. It was in this chamber, dubbed The Conservatory of Life, that wed face our third keeper, Freya. Like the others, Freyas good intentions had been corrupted by a evil presence deep in the crust of the earth. She planned to put a stop to our advances by leveraging her power over nature. We chose to chop down the three elders, deferring hard mode to another day.Initially, Freya was untouchable, protected from damage by her "Attuned to Nature" stacks. As the fight progressed, she summoned Snaplashers, Storm Lashers, and Ancient Water Elementals, all of whom did not wish to be friends. As we worked through the kinks of her summoned soldiers, she lost stacks of her attunement buff -- eventually leaving her naked as a noob in the woods. That was the signal, and we burned her to the ground, keeping an eye out for any sprouting Blessings of Eonar; foilage that would heal her if left to grow unchecked. It only took a few attempts to get a feel for the craziness of the add tanking. Once we had that polished, Freya succumbed to the might of the 25-Man progression team. Three guardians down, one to go.
Neps began to take bids on Freyas loot, the first of which were tokens for the Tier 8 legs. One such token was the Legplates of the Wayward Conqueror: potential owners were Priests, Warlocks...and Paladins.
"Closing bids, 5...4...3...2...1," said Neps into Vent, "Winner: Divine".
Wow.
[Officer][Dalans]: Really?
[Officer][Cheeseus]: lol
The ability to exchange loot with players that were present when the loot dropped (for up to 24 hours) was a wonderful feature that Blizzard added to the game, to help us mediate some of this loot drama. Unfortunately, that feature wouldnt be implemented for another three months. So I said nothing, but only shook my head in disappointment, a gesture which ended up being completely lost on a person who was hundreds of miles away.
For a Paladin, he wasnt exactly demonstrating the best judgement.
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| Descendants of Draenor defeats Mimiron, wrapping "Heroic: The Keepers of Ulduar", Ulduar |
Mimiron, Assemble!
At last, the pi�ce de r�sistance. As our third weekend in Ulduar neared its end, the raid took a trip deep into the heart of Ulduar. Our destination was so vastly remote and buried below the surface that we had to board an underground train just to get there. This location, an underground machinists shop, bore immense pistons and gear cogs with teeth larger than any of us. Electrical currents lept across doorways as we moved into the central lab. We were tiny specs crawling across a cog in the machinations of some far more extraordinary contraption. This was The Spark of Imagination, home to the final of the four keepers of Ulduar, a clockwork gnome named Mimiron.Mimiron was an intense and complex encounter, split into four different phases. In phase one, Mimiron commandeered a literal tank, a smaller version of Flame Leviathan. Our own figurative tanks had to control it in the center of Mimirons lab, blowing cooldowns to survive Plasma Blast while avoiding ejected mines. Defeating this tank took us to phase two. A gatling gun emerged from the floor, pivoting and blasting us with no uniform pattern to speak of. While healers struggled to keep up with the chaotic damage, Mimiron launched missiles from this gatling gun, painting targets of instant death on the ground. Phase three had Mimiron piloting a miniature aircraft. Safely out of melee, he would require a ranged DPS as a tank -- a throwback to old encounters like High King Maulgar, Illidari Council and Leotheras the Blind. The secret to grounding him came in the from of gravity cores which we farmed off his bot defenses.
Once the raid became accustomed to the nuances of all three of these phases, they would be tested one final time in a fourth phase, in which all three units would re-assemble into a single gigantic robot, employing all of the above mechanics against us at once. All three machines had to be killed again...and all three of them had to be destroyed within seconds of each other. Failing to do so meant each component repairing one another, whittling us away in the process.
I remembered back to similarly complex fights like Lady Vashj and Kaelthas and wondered how many nights of work we would need to put into Mimiron in order to execute a kill. I had my answer within the hour. 45 minutes before the scheduled end time for the Sunday evening raid, a broken and badly beaten 25-Man Progression team limped through the third and final attempt on Mimiron. With only 15 of us alive, the last bit of damage was poured evenly into all three parts of Mimirons gigantic Voltron-style mech, and in one final moment, he twitched, shook, buzzed, and teetered over as his robotic components lost power. "Heroic: The Keepers of Ulduar" was complete, and after three weeks, we were 3/4ths of the way through the instance, earning ourselves another early end to the raid.
Hard mode is gonna suck on this one, I thought. And I couldnt wait.
---
"Hold on a second," said Neps as the cheering died down, "I think Divines pants are in here somewhere."
Vent lit up with a round of laughter. The ping of a whisper notification caught my eye and I glanced down to my chat window:
[W From][Cheeseus]: We need to talk about Divine after the raid.
I chuckled.
[W To][Cheeseus]: About his supreme lack of sensitivity surrounding loot?
[W From][Cheeseus]: About the fact that hes 7th in healing.
Well. This was a bigger issue than I thought.
Wed only brought six healers to the raid.
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