Survival Hunter

I have been playing my Survival Hunter Brieanna more lately. The reason I wasn't playing her as much was the queue time. It takes a lot longer to queue as DPS than it does to queue as a healer on my Priest Brieonna. DPS takes me anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes where Heals takes me up to 2 minutes to queue on the average.

When I first started playing my Hunter again my DPS was a little low because I was out of practice. I was hitting around 8-9k average on her when I first started and now am averaging around 11k and had a personal best of 15.9k dps on one of the boss fights. The more I play her the better it gets. I have been doing my random daily heroic on her every day lately too to get Valor points. I am over 900 now and will be getting my first piece of Valor gear soon. I am not sure if I will be getting the cloak or a trinket first, I will jump off that bridge when I get there.

I am going to try and split my time between my Hunter and Priest now so I can stay in practice on both and DPS or Heal as needed. It is a lot of fun playing a hunter, I just wish the queues were shorter. To fill in the time while I am waiting for the queue I do my Tol Barad daily's, going for the trink there, or just kill stuff and skin it for leather.

I traded my gun for a bow and am using that now. The only problem I had with the gun was all the noise it made. I know I can turn the volume off when playing to eliminate that problem but there are audible warnings in the game I didn't want to miss so this was a simple solution. It is so much nicer and quieter now :).

Don't Stand In The Fire

When you are in a dungeon, don't stand in anything. I am not going to go into a lot of detail because, as I have been told, it goes without saying.

If you are in a dungeon and you are standing in something that is killing you, move. It's as simple as that. Move. I can not get over the number of people that will just stand in something that is hitting them for 8-10k plus damage (Normal Dungeon) a second EVERY SECOND. A few steps in any direction and they could be out of it. There are very few instances where you need to stand in something that is killing you in a normal or even heroic 5 man dungeon. The last boss in Halls of Origination, Rahj, is one of the exceptions.

Now when I start healing a dungeon on my Priest Brieonna, the first thing I say is "Don't stand in anything". That is my disclaimer. Someone will always say "That goes without saying", and it should go without saying. After that if someone is standing in something I will throw them a couple heals to give them time to get out of it, and if they don't move I let them die. I am a healer, not a babysitter. It's even in the loading tips at startup: Don't stand in the fire!

Brieonna - Level 71 Holy Priest

I was hoping when I got Brieonna to level 71 I would stop doing Utgarde Keep and move onto other dungeons.

I did get another dungeon to do, the Nexus, but I am still doing the majority of my dungeon runs through Utgarde Keep. It is getting a lot better, I have had a lot more luck grouping with competent players but it is just getting old. I want some different scenery. I did 2 runs through the Nexus and that was great. I got a nice wand and a nice pair of boots from there. I was the only caster so I didn't have any competition for them.

I am still questing in Borean Tundra between dungeons but I have really slowed down, burning out a little. I need to get on my 80's and do some daily's so I can get some gold together for 300 riding skill for Brieonna and the Tome of Cold Weather Flight for Breeonna so she will be able to fly when she gets to Northrend. Being able to fly as soon as you get there makes questing and leveling go so much faster.

Brieonna - Level 70 Holy Priest

Brieonna is level 70 now and questing in Northrend.

I have been doing some of the Northrend dungeons too. Well, only one really, Utgarde Keep. The first run I had through there was great, we didn't have any problems and I didn't lose anyone until the very end where I ended up dying. Everyone said the last boss is really tough to heal and he is, he has this staggering smash thing he does that really deals out a lot of damage if the tank does not have him turned away from everyone. We had a Pally tank in that group.

After that I ended up in groups with one DK tank after another. None of which could hold aggro, all of which were losing about 3/4 of their HP every hit. It is hard to keep them alive when they take damage so fast and you are also trying to keep everyone else alive because they can't hold aggro. I ended up bailing on a couple groups.

We had one really bad run today in UK, it wasn't the tanks fault, we had a Pally tank and he was doing a good job. It was this Hunters fault. This Hunter, Whinn, from Frostwolf, was pulling mobs. They were the reason our first 3 tanks left, the last tank was putting up with them. They really had no clue what they were doing and it was making everyone's job a lot harder than it had to be. Finally in the end, after everyone told them what they thought of them, they aggro'd the last boss and left group... Good riddance but the boss bugged and we never got to finish. Losers like that shouldn't be allowed to group much less play.

I had another good group after that with a Druid tank and we finished that one out. I was starting to get a complex, from some of the previous groups where I couldn't keep them alive, until I grouped with some guildies and we did a run. It went really well and proved to me that I wasn't the problem.

I have run UK so many times now that I am really looking forward to level 71 in the hopes it will put me into a different dungeon.

Brieonna - Northrend

I got Brieonna to level 68 and can now start questing in Northrend. I got her the Tome of Cold Weather Flight, for 1,000 gold, and she learned that so she can now fly as soon as she gets to Northrend.

I am looking forward to doing the dungeons in Northrend (WotLK). I will not be eligible for the Ice Crown dungeons, Forge of Souls, Pit of Saron or Halls of Reflection, until I do the preliminary quests. I think I will hold off on that for awhile when I am eligible because I don't want to rush right into healing Halls of Reflection.

I had a few runs through Sethekk Halls and I really don't like that place. It is one wipe after another. It seems like everything in there fears, and when they do, people get feared into other groups of mobs and things just get out of hand in a hurry. I will be happy if I never see the inside of that place again.

Brieonna - Level 67 Holy Priest

I got Brieonna up a few more levels, to level 67 now. I am less than 10 bars away from Northrend. I haven't completed any quests except dungeon quests lately, dungeons are all I have been doing.

I have come across a few good DK tanks in the last few days and a lot of bad ones. For the most part it is still my opinion that most DK's can't tank. They can't hold aggro like a Warrior, Pally, or Druid tank can. That is most of them, not all of them. There have been a few that held aggro great and it was a pleasure to heal them.

When a tank can't hold aggro it makes my job a lot harder. Instead of just keeping the tank healed, which I usually can do using only HoT's, I end up having to spam heal the entire group every battle. It is tedious and nerve wracking. Usually those tanks aren't very well geared either so they take a lot of healing too.

I am up to, and have completed, Sethekk Halls. That is the last one I did tonight and it was brutal. It seems like you can not do a normal pull in there, the tank tries for a small pull and ends up with half the room. It seems like everything fears too. I put fear ward on the tank when it wasn't on cool down but others ended up getting feared into other groups of mobs and it was just brutal. We finally did complete it though and I got a nice cape off the second boss. I can't wear it for one more level but I enchanted it and it is ready to go. My gearscore is up to 1905 now and my HoT's tick for around 800 every 3 seconds.

I got a nice pair of pants from a quest I turned in from Mana Tombs which I was able to put 3 +19 Spellpower gems in, that brought my spellpower up nicely.

I will be in Northrend tomorrow, I just don't have the energy to get the last 10 bars tonight, and I will be into a whole new set of dungeons there.

Brieonna - Level 63 Holy Priest

Brieonna is level 63 now, 5 levels away from Northrend. I just haven't had the motivation to level her as much lately so it is slowing down.

I have been doing more questing than dungeons lately. I am finding that the people in the dungeons at this low Outlands level are not really geared enough to handle it, they are mostly still wearing Pre-BC gear and it doesn't help. It seems like a lot of these people have waited until Outlands to start doing dungeons too, they don't seem to be very experienced. The dungeons I have been in haven't been too bad though, just a little harder than they should be I think.

I am questing in Terokkar Forest now and getting good XP there. While I am there I will quest in Bone Wastes then move on to Nagrand, which is where I will probably hit 68 and head off to Northrend. It won't be long now.

Brieonna - Level 58 Holy Priest

I got Brieonna to level 58 tonight and am now in Outlands. The first thing I did when I hit 58 was abandon all my quests in Azeroth, I won't be needing them anymore.

I did some daily's on Brieanna tonight to get some gold together for Brieonna's 225 riding skill and mount. Ever since I got hacked I don't keep a lot of gold on hand, I earn it as I need it. Blizzard restored all my gold, with the exception of 1,500, but if I get hacked again I don't want them getting any gold, or very little.

I grabbed a few quests when I got to Outlands but haven't started to do any yet. I am not sure which dungeons I will be queuing into there, the top end Pre-BC ones or the BC ones. It really doesn't make a difference, there is good XP to be had in both.

I did a few runs in Lower Blackrock Spire tonight. Some were good, one was not. In one of them we had a Pally tank that could not hold aggro. On anything. I came into that one in progress, their healer had left. It didn't take me long to realize why. In the first fight I was the first to die. I threw a HoT (Heal over Time) onto the tank, a very low level, low threat heal, and all the mobs came off him and right over to me. He had no threat, he couldn't hold aggro. Usually in a wipe the tank is the first one to die. I went through 2 wipes with that group, which were only 2 fights, same mobs, before I bailed. In both wipes the tank was the last one to die, what does that tell you? They weren't interested in him at all, the tank, the guy that is supposed to be holding aggro...

I did have a couple good groups though, with good tanks and those were a breeze. We got the instance done and I got my achievement.

Brieonna – Level 56 Holy Priest

I got Brieonna to level 56 tonight. I finished up and turned in a couple quests in Un’Goro crater in Kalimdor then headed to Western Plaguelands to quest, and did a couple quests there. I would much rather quest there as it is a lot closer to the trainers when I have to train and a lot closer when I hearth back to Dalaran. When I was questing in Kalimdor it took me 10 minutes, or more, to get back every time I had to train or hearthed for any reason.

I did some random dungeons, I am up to Dire Maul East now. I did 3 runs through Upper City in Blackrock Depths and 2 through Dire Maul East. Those were good for a lot of XP.

I did a Priest quest in Azshara that was part of a chain. The end reward was, I thought, a nice wand. When I checked it against the wand I recently received, as a drop in BRD, it wasn’t as good. The final quest called for me to go into Sunken Temple, which I am kind of past now, so I dropped it. I would have had to queue specifically for that dungeon and it just wasn’t worth it.

I am now less than 2 levels away from Outlands, I am going to have to start doing daily’s again on my 80’s to get some gold for flying lessons and a mount.

Brieonna - Level 54 Holy Priest

Brieonna is level 54 now and I have done very little questing lately. I have been getting all my experience from doing random dungeons. I got 2 1/2 levels today doing them.

I am only 3 1/2 levels away from Outlands now. I am now pretty much only queuing into Blackrock Depths and Sunken Temple, although my days in Sunken Temple might be over now, I queued into BRD the last 5 times I queued. I stayed with one group through 3 runs in there. The part we are queuing into is the prison. The boss in there is not that far in and you can really get it done in 5 minutes or less. What we were doing after that is going through and killing all the other bosses we could kill at our level, spending another hour to an hour and a half in there each time. The XP is incredible doing that and that's how I got my levels and bars. I also got some enchanting mats from disenchanting items so all in all it was definitely worth it.

There is a scheduled shutdown, so after that I will be back to the dungeons and more levels. I hope to have Brieonna in Outlands within the next day or two.

Brieonna - Level 50 Holy Priest

I have been working on Brieonna and got her to level 50 now. I have been doing a combination of questing and random dungeons, mostly random dungeons. In a dungeon it is my job to heal and keep people alive.

I am up to Sunken Temple and Blackrock Depths now. I still have some good groups and some bad groups. I love the good groups and usually bail on the bad groups. I can not believe how under geared some of the "tanks" are that actually have the guts to click on the tank box in the dungeon finder. It takes more than being a plate wearer, or Druid, to be a tank. You have to have some gear and at least a rudimentary clue what you are doing. If you are grossly under geared don't pull 10 times more than you can handle, and if you can't hold aggro, don't pull large groups of mobs, this isn't rocket science people...

Fail Tanks

I had a couple pretty bad runs today on Brieonna. The main problem was the tank, what's the hurry?

The first one was in Zul'Farrak. I zoned in and the first thing I saw was the tank had typed "I hope you're good at healing and dispelling Brieonna". The next thing I saw, when I looked up, was the tank was at 40% health and nowhere in sight... They had mounted and gathered up the first 3 groups of mobs. Not the first group of 3 mobs but 3 groups of 3, 4 and 3 mobs. That was 10 mobs. I barely made it to them in time to heal them before they died. When those were finally down they said "Do you see why I said that?", to which I replied "Yeah, because you're an idiot. This has fail written all over it, I'm outta here", and I bailed. I don't understand why these tanks think they need to set some kind of new speed record doing these instances. I had another one in Maraudon that was doing something similar, they were running on to the next group before the last group was dead. What do I do, stay and heal the people that are fighting the last group or run ahead and heal the tank that is fighting the new group? I have just been bailing on groups like that.

I had another group in Maraudon where everyone was a tank. The tank was pulling and tanking and so was a Paladin, Warlock and Druid. I was supposed to keep all of them alive... I bailed on that group too. What ends up happening in a group like that is, I end up getting attacked and take a beating or die because the mobs come after me when I heal.

When I am in a good group, and there were quite a few that were good, I can usually keep the tank healed with HoT's (Heal over Time) and an occasional flash heal. I rarely have to heal anyone else unless we are fighting something that has some kind of AoE (Area of Effect) attack that hits everyone. The other people that might need heals are melee fighters like Warriors, Paladins, some Shamans and Rogues because they are right there fighting full contact. That is the way it works. A Warlock, Mage or Shadow Priest, someone who wears cloth, should not be melee fighting anything. They are wearing cloth, they are not melee fighters, they are ranged fighters that should not come in contact with anything. I end up burning all my mana just trying to keep them alive and don't have time to take care of the people who really should be receiving the healing.

At the first sign of trouble, tank going recklessly fast, people other than the tank pulling, I give them a warning. If it's the tank I tell them to slow down. If someone other than the tank is pulling I tell them we have a tank, let them do their job. If they listen fine, we can continue on. If they continue in the same manner I tell them I am leaving and bail. I never do it during a fight or going into a fight, I wait until we are at a standstill or as much of a standstill as some tanks allow.

I realize that some of these people are on their first characters and don't really know what they are doing, although in the mid forties they should have a better idea than some seem to have, and try to give them some advice. Some take it but some already know everything there is to know. The ones that already know everything there is to know are the ones I usually end up bailing on because they are the ones that will not listen and continue right on doing what they were doing.

You can usually spot someone who has an 80 and is familiar with instances, they move along at a pace everyone is comfortable with, they don't pull anything if they are not the tank, and they seem to know what they are doing, those are the groups I like best.

Spirit vs Spellpower

I ran into a little trouble on Brieonna when I got carried away stacking spirit. I was focusing on gear that primarily had spirit then intellect. I wasn't keeping an eye on my spellpower while I was doing that.

The end result of that is I found myself having a hard time healing in Dungeons that used to be easy. It seemed like I had to keep hitting the tank with full heals instead of just keeping a HoT on them and hitting them once in awhile with a small heal. When I looked into that I found that my spellpower had dropped almost 60 points. Big mistake.

Spirit is good for you in the fact that it determines how much mana you regenerate. Mana is regenerated every 5 seconds and the more spirit you have the more mana you are going to generate. Eventually you will get to the point where you will actually generate mana while you are casting. Obviously more spirit is good because it will take you longer to run out of mana. More intellect is good as well because the more intellect you have the more mana you will have.

But neither of those are good if you don't have enough spellpower to get the job done, which is what happened to me.

I regeared and got an enchantment on my staff which brought my spellpower up over 70 points. The difference was like night and day. Now I can primarily keep the tank, and everyone else, healed just using my HoT's. Enchanting my staff was tricky. Obviously I wanted to get the highest spellpower enchantment I could on it, but because it is a BoA (Bind on Account) item I was limited to pre-BC "Vanilla WoW" enchantments. I could only put an enchantment on it that had no level restrictions, one that was available pre-BC.

The highest enchantment available was +30 spellpower. There were 2 scrolls for that on the auction house, one for 375 gold and the other for 500 gold. That seemed a little pricy to me. I ended up having all the materials to have it done so I set out to find someone who had the enchantment to do it for me. That proved futile. +30 spellpower is a rare enchantment that only drops in Molten Core, one of the two pre-BC 40 man raids. No one on had it.

I ended up getting +29 spellpower, which I guess is a common enough enchantment, and had that done with my mats. I had to go out and farm one of the mats but that didn't take me long. I tipped the enchanter 20 gold to put it on Brieonna's staff and another 20 gold to put it on Breeonna's mace so she would have it too.

Now they are both performing better than ever :).

Brieonna - Level 38 Holy Priest

I have been working on my priest Brieonna lately and got her to level 38. I have been healing in dungeons, as well as questing, and that is going pretty well for the most part. I still get the occasional groups where the tank thinks they are better than they are and pull too much, or everyone thinks they are a tank, but not as often any more.

I have no problem bailing on those groups now. I bailed on a couple today in Scarlet Monastary Cathedral. In the last one the tank, who was a poorly geared Druid, pulled half the Cathedral. He really wasn't geared to take on more than 4 mobs at once. He pulled 15+ mobs. There is no use sticking around in a group like that because it will just keep failing, so I bailed. There was another group where I told the tank to slow down or he was going to wipe us. I told him I was out of mana so I was going to drink, then I was going to go back and loot all the stuff I didn't have time to loot because he was moving too fast. He told me not to worry about looting, it was all junk. I told him I was worried about it because I needed the cloth for First Aid. He decided to go ahead and pull another group while I was drinking so I bailed.

I am up to, and have completed the achievement for, Uldaman. I don't really like this one, too many corners for a tank that is in too much of a hurry to run around. I guess I will be stuck with this one for the next 4 or 5 random dungeons though. This one is pretty high for me so I get really good XP out of it.

Only 2 more levels and I can ride my Armored Brown Bear. I already have Reins of the Armored Brown Bear and am just waiting until level 40 so I can train 150 riding and ride it.

Brieonna - Level 31 Holy Priest

I have been working on Brieonna and she is coming along nicely. She is level 31 now. I have been doing my usual combination of Dungeons and quests to level her faster. I think I might stick with the healing, at least for now. I had some more bad groups but that is gonna happen, especially at this level.

I had one exceptionally bad group in Scarlet Monastary Graveyard tonight. It was basically a free for all. Everyone was doing their own thing, there was no teamwork and it was almost impossible to heal. There was a Warlock that was rounding up everything in sight, then using Hellfire to try and burn them down. Hellfire is one of the worst Warlock spells as far as I am concerned. Basically it creates bursts of fire around the Warlock, but it also damages the Warlock and everyone in the group that is in range. Try healing through that while everyone is being attacked by everything he aggroed on top of it. That is the first group I left before completion. It was by far the worst group I have ever been in, ever.

I think I have at least the rest of this level in SMGY before I get into the library, that will be nice. I always thought the graveyard was a nice easy place, but some of these groups have shown me how wrong I was about that.

I can't wait to get to level 40 now and get my 100% mount. As usual I will get the Armored Brown bear for her so I have to start thinking about how I am going to get to Dalaran. I paid a Mage to port Breeonna and will probably do the same with Brieonna.