Brieonna - Level 20 Holy Priest

I decided to roll a Priest and give healing a try, so I created Brieonna. I had a little opportunity to heal on my Shaman Breeonna on occasion and thought it might be something I liked. Whether or not I like it is still being decided... I started Brieonna Wednesday night and by tonight, Thursday night, I had her to level 20. I got her the 75 riding skill and got her a mount which is going to make leveling go even faster.

I have healed in a few instances so far and have not done too bad. Oh, there were some bad times, like in the Deadmines tonight when we had a tank that thought he was better than he really was. Actually that happened twice. They would pull way more than they could actually tank and hold aggro on which would cause mobs to break away from them and attack other players. One of them was so poorly geared, which caused his health to drop so fast, while he was making a pull of a dozen or so mobs (generally 8 or 9 more than he had to), that I had to spam him with full heals instead of HoT's (Heal over Time) and that was causing me to generate more threat than he was so half the mobs would break away and attack me. I couldn't heal him, or anyone else, while I was busy just trying to stay alive.

The majority of the groups I was in did have good tanks though and there was no problem at all. They did not pull more mobs than they could handle and I had no problem healing them and anyone else that needed it. People who wear cloth should not need much healing, they are not melee fighters. People who wear cloth are generally casters who stand back from the mobs and cast. With a good tank they can do that and not take any damage, or very little damage, if the tank is doing his job. If the tank is full of himself and wearing gear 10 or more levels below his level because "why upgrade gear when you level so fast?", and pulling way more mobs than he can hold aggro on, then you're gonna have a bad time.

So the jury is still out on whether or not I will stay Holy and heal or switch to Shadow and DPS.

Currently, in Holy spec, when I did DPS I was at the top of the damage list... I am wearing Heirloom gear, similar to what Breeonna is wearing, and it makes a huge difference. My Gearscore right now is around 1250. The Gearscore of most of the people I was in the dungeons with was in the 60-120 range. At level 1 I had a Gearscore of 1179. I am using 5 pieces of Heirloom gear, shoulders, chest, staff and two trinkets. It is called Heirloom gear because instead of being soulbound (bound to whatever character you equip it to) it is bound to your account. That means you can send it to any character on your account and keep passing it along after you reach 80 and don't need it anymore. As a matter of fact Brieonna and Breeonna are sharing the two trinkets because I couldn't see spending the emblems to get 2 sets of identical trinkets.

I will continue to heal and see if the majority of groups end up being better than some of the ones I was in tonight. I only healed for one night so it is too soon to make a decision.

Breeonna 3/22/10

The past couple days I have been working on getting Breeonna leveled up. That is going really well, I leveled her up 8 levels in 2 days, from 18 to 26.

I have been doing quests, yellow, orange and red ones only, I drop them if they turn green. That ensures me maximum experience gains from each quest I do. I have also been doing dungeons on her. Today I ended up in Wailing Caverns for the random daily. That wasn't too bad, I had done that one before on Wranngar, the only problem was our tank had a Gear Score (GS) of 5... Gear Score is used to determine the quality of a persons gear. 5 is not good. To give you an example Breeonna, at level 26, has a Gear Score of 800. Our tank was wearing gray and white gear, some of it was the stuff you are born with. Needless to say we didn't get that random done. I have also done Deadmines, Shadowfang Keep and Stockades, all of those went well. I did Shadowfang Keep twice yesterday.

I am now going to be questing in Duskwood before moving on to Stranglethorn Vale.

The Deadmines 6/29/09

I ran someone through the The Deadmines 4 times today, trying to get Cruel Barb to drop, it didn't. I have been through The Deadmines over 100 times and I have only seen it drop 4 or 5 times, it is a pretty rare drop. I have also run people through who have gotten it on their first run, it is all a matter of luck.

The Deadmines is located in Westfall and I think you get the quests to go in there around level 15. The main quest is to kill Edwin VanCleef, the Defia's Kingpin, and bring back the Head of VanCleef.

You enter The Deadmines in Moonbrook. There are mobs to deal with as soon as you enter the instance, the first boss is Rhahk'Zor the foreman. He always drops a blue item, Rhahk'Zor's Hammer. When you kill him the door behind him opens automatically, beware when anything opens automatically, it means a patrol is going to come up behind you.

After going through that door you deal with some more mobs, and off to the left there is a little tunnel, go in there are see if Miner Johnson is there. He is a rare elite. You can tell a rare elite because they have a silver dragon around their portrait instead of a gold one. He can drop Miner's Cape and Gold-plated Buckler which are blue items. He is not always there, hence 'rare elite'.

From there you kill some more mobs until you get to a door you open, once again there will be a patrol that comes up behind you. That door lets you into the Mast Room. In the Mast Room you have to deal with a bunch of elite goblins that can stun even a level 80. The boss in there is Sneed's Shredder, a robot operated by Sneed. Sneed's Shredder will drop these 2 blue items, Buzzer Blade or Buzz Saw. Sneed will drop Gold-flecked Gloves or Taskmaster Axe also blue items. All of these bosses drop other items but these are the ones people are after. A door will open and a patrol will come up behind you.

From there you kill some more mobs as you work your way to the Goblin Foundry. This is packed full of goblins and it is where most people usually end up giving up. The boss in there is Gilnid, he's the smelter. He will drop Smelting Pants or Lavishly Jeweled Ring, both blue items. On our 4 runs he dropped Smelting Pants 3 times and Lavishly Jeweled Ring once. Killing him causes another door to open and another patrol to come up behind you. You are almost there.

You continue through that door and have to fight more mobs, most of which are not elite. On the left, as you are going along, you will see a tunnel, you need to go in there and grab the Defias Gunpowder which you will use a little farther on to shoot a cannon at a door to blow it open. An elite always comes when you pick up the Defias Gunpowder so be ready for that. Continue down that tunnel until you come to the cannon. Right click on the cannon to fire it. It will blow the door open and some mobs will come running in. Once you kill them you can enter Ironclad Cove. This is where the boat and Edwin VanCleef are located.

You will need to fight your way through some more mobs to get to the ramp that leads up to the boat. You need to watch out here. First there is a treasure chest at the bottom of the ramp that is fake, it is there to draw you over so the 2 stealthed Defias Henchmen at the bottom of the ramp can attack you. As soon as they attack you the next boss, Mr. Smite the ships mate, comes down the ramp and joins in. He gets aggravated pretty easy and stomps which stuns everyone. Depending on how fast you can kill him he may do this once, twice or 3 times. Unless you can one shot him. If you are the correct level to be in there you won't be able to one shot him but most 80's can if you have one running you. He will drop either Thief's Blade, Smite's Reaver or Smite's Mighty Hammer which are blues. He also drops other items that are green or white.

Go to the top of the ramp and go right, you will have to fight mobs the whole way, mobs and their parrots. There is a good chance that a parrot cage will drop while you are in the Deadmines which gives you a parrot for a pet. You will go under a bridge. If you have any low level people with you, keep them away from that bridge. Tell them to stay back. They won't listen and will come up to the bridge causing all the mobs above to come down and kill them, happens every time. You will need to work your way up a series of ramps on the side of the boat until you are on the deck. There you encounter another boss, Captain Greenskin. He does a circuit around the cabin with 2 other mobs. He will drop either Emberstone Staff, Blackened Defias Belt or Impaling Harpoon which are blue items. He will also drop some green and white items.

Now you are ready for VanCleef. He is in the cabin in the center of the deck. He has a bunch of mobs with him that are stealthed so be ready for that. I usually draw him out of the cabin and then use an AoE to take him and his mobs down. He will drop one of the following, Corsair's Overshirt, Cape of the Brotherhood, Blackened Defias Armor or Cruel Barb. Everyone goes for Cruel Barb and it rarely ever drops. There is one more boss to deal with now.

You need to jump off the deck on the opposite side that you can into it on, that will bring you down to the lower deck and probably drop you right on top of Cookie, the ships cook. This is the last boss. Cookie will drop Cookie's Tenderizer or Cookie's Stirring Rod, both blue items, along with some white items. That is it, you are done. You can clean up the reast of the mobs on the lower deck if you want, or just go down the ramp towards the exit. There are some more mobs off to the right on your way out if you want to kill and loot them.

That's pretty much The Deadmines in a nutshell.

Good Luck :)

Wranngar