Back Again 9/11

I am back again after a little hiatus. I had some computer problems, immediately followed by hurricane problems but I have finally been able to get back on and do some playing.

I have been playing my Holy Priest Brieonna mostly, healing normals until I get back into shape and can heal heroic's again. That doesn't mean I haven't been playing my Druid Wranngar or Hunter Brieanna because I have, I have been doing Heroics and normals on those two also.

One of the unfortunate side affects of my system crashing is that I lost the thousands of screen shots I had and the hundreds of links to items from Thottbot that I had. I guess I will be starting over on that. I do have a lot of the images on a flash drive so I am not totally lost, but I didn't back up my links for some reason.

Going forward I plan on trying some raiding again. I also have my work cut out for me earning Valor Points for the 378 Valor gear that is now available.

Treads of Fleeting Joy

I only get the chance to do one or two heroic dungeons a night on Wranngar lately but I have been doing as many as I can for the valor points. I was saving them up for Treads of Fleeting Joy which I finally got last night. I have also managed to amass 37 Chaos Orbs in the process which I need to convert to gold by selling them to people who want epic 359 leather and mail items made.

My new boots bring Wranngar's item level up to 354 equipped now. My dps has been up and down the last week or so. Some dungeons I do 15k+ dps and others I am only hitting 9 or 10k. It really all depends on the group and the buffs. If I have a decent group and good buffs my dps goes through the roof. If I have a tank that can't hold aggro (I have been told I am an aggro whore) I spend more time getting pounded on than I do fighting. If I have a tank that can hold good aggro, especially on groups, I am all set. I was using an AoE that I have on a group in one dungeon last night and I hit 34k dps for that fight.

I will keep plugging away one or two here and there to collect more valor points for valuable rewards. The only problem is there are only 2 more rewards to be had from valor points then the only way I will be able to upgrade to 359+ gear is raiding which I have not had much luck with in the past. When I have tried raiding I always seem to end up in groups of quitters and we never get anywhere.

Posted on A World of Warcraft Blog

Random Dungeons and Daily's

I haven't been playing a lot lately but I do try to get on every day to do my daily cooking, for the Chef's Award's, and at least one heroic. I haven't been in one of the new heroic's that opened with the last patch yet. I hear they take quite awhile to finish, are like a 5 man raid and just haven't felt like dealing with that now.

So I do my daily cooking for the awards and get in one or two heroics. I have seen a lot of people quitting and groups falling apart lately. I am not sure what the reason is behind that. Well one of them I can understand. I was in a Grim Batol heroic yesterday and we were wiping on 50% of the trash pulls. That doesn't bode well for the rest of the dungeon as it is the hardest original Cata heroic. That group fell apart and I was kind of relieved. I did a total of six heroics yesterday and GB did come up again but we finished it that time.

I have done all the heroics at least once in the last week and some of them many times. Aside from people quitting, rage or otherwise, I had good groups for the most part, one of the exceptions being the group I was with in GB.

I have been doing well on dps on Wranngar lately and hit 16.7k in one of the dungeons, a personal best so far. That was on a boss fight when I pop everything. I usually average 11-13k overall for a run depending on buffs and the group. I have almost all the cooking recipes on Wranngar now and will be able to start working on getting Gomorra all the recipes next. My Hunter Brieanna already has all the Cata recipes.

Some Random Daily Heroics

I was able to get on the last few days and run my random daily heroic on Wranngar, for the Valor Points, and tonight I was able to get Relic of Golganneth. That replaced the item level 346 relic I was using.

Over the last few days I have done The Throne of Tides, Stonecore, Grim Batol, and tonight, The Vortex Pinnacle. I have been getting into dungeons in progress a lot lately but that is ok, I just want a chance to win the Chaos Orb and get my Valor Points. There is no gear left for me in the old heroics.

I got into Throne of Tides after the first boss and we skipped the optional boss so that ended up being a pretty quick run for me. I didn't win the orb.

The Stonecore I got to run satrt to finish but I didn't win the orb in there either. That was a pretty good run with no wipes. Sometimes the first and third boss can be pretty tough in there but we didn't have any problem.

Grim Batol I got in at the last boss, literally. I zoned in and I was standing there looking at him. That suited me just fine. The third boss in there can be pretty tough sometimes. And apparently the last bosss too because someone left. We got the last boss down without a problem though and didn't let the adds hatch any eggs. The adds didn't even get to any eggs. I didn't win the orb in there either.

Tonight in The Vortex Pinnacle I died once at the last boss, I was lagging so bad I didn't see him making a grounding field until the storm hit and that killed me. I did win the orb from that run so it was worth it though.

I think I am going to start running the two new heroics tomorrow. They drop 353 gear and I would like to replace my remaining 346 gear with that.

Random Daily Heroics - 5/5-6/11

It's been awhile since I logged into WoW and even longer since I posted anything. I did the random daily heroic the last couple days on Wranngar.

Thursday I got Shadowfang Keep for my daily. That went well even though I didn't have DBM or Recount loaded. I was in there with a friend and they let me know what Recount was saying, I was having a little lag but not doing bad on the DPS. I averaged 13k for the run. We didn't have any problems on the run. There were a couple deaths but I wasn't one of them. I didn't get the orb, just my 70 Valor Points.

Friday I had Grim Batol. I got in after the second boss and we skipped the third boss so it was a pretty quick run. We did wipe once on the last boss though, the only one I fought. In heroic Grim Batol you have to plan how to take the adds before you engage the last boss. I guess the tank was in a hurry though and charged right in. When the adds came out I picked the right side each time. None of the adds on my side hatched an egg. Unfortunately the same could not be said about the mobs on the other side. Each of the ones that went to the other side hatched an egg, so we were getting dps'd by the dragonwhelps and they were healing the boss. We wiped.

After that they decided to assign sides. I got the left side, opposite of the side I was doing on the first attempt. We tried it again, again none of the adds on my side hatched an egg but one got hatched on the other side. We made it through that time though and got him down. I got my 70 Valor Points and the Chaos Orb so it was a good run for me.

Now when I look in the dungeon finder it says I can do five more dungeons this week. It also shows 70 Valor Points as the reward. I think they made it so you can do all seven of your dungeons in one day, and get 70 Valor Points from each, but the cap is seven per week. After your seven for the week are up I would assume you get gold like you would have after your first one each day. I am not sure, I will try it out the next time I am on.

Posted on A World of Warcraft Blog - 5/7/11

Old Ironforge - Patch 4.1

They have finally opened Old Ironforge in Patch 4.1. To be honest I was a little disappointed after checking it out. After hearing about it for years, and the ban if you were caught there, I guess I just expected it to be larger with buildings you could go inside of and check out. I expected there to be more.

It is kind of cool to see where the Dwarves lived before they made Ironforge but there is so little there and what is there you can't go inside of. Aside from a few walkways and a couple tunnels there is not much else.

Here are some pictures from down there starting with the entrance located in the King's room in Ironforge.


Posted on A World of Warcraft Blog 4/26/11

Random Daily Heroic: Stonecore - 4/23/11

Today Wranngar's random daily heroic was Stonecore. If you can make it past the first boss in this one you have it made.

We had a good group today and making it past the first boss, Corborus, was not a problem although the healer did die. The thing you have to watch out for on this boss is when he is underground. He travels around and comes to the surface in random spots that you will see as a dust cloud on the ground. Standing in that cloud, or even too close to it, is instant death. That is how the healer died. Fortunately the healer died during the bosses second time underground so we were able to finish him off when he surfaced without any problem.

From there we cleared some more trash and got to the next boss, the dragon Slabhide. This boss is pretty easy as long as you keep your eyes open and your wits about you. Make sure to get behind a column when he does his crystal barrage, don't stand in any lava or dark spots and you have it made. We took this boss down easily.

A little more trash and we were at the third boss, Ozruk. The secret is to tank this boss facing the wall in the tunnel he is in. Just take him back and forth, side to side so when he does his ground slam it goes into the wall. After that make sure you put a DoT on him when he has the blue glow around him and get away when he does shatter if you are melee. We wiped once on this one but that was not too bad considering it was the tanks first time tanking him.

Some more light trash got us to the last boss in this dungeon, High Priestess Azil. There are a few things you have to do here, stay out of the gravity wells, interrupt her force grip and don't stand in, or near, any dust on the ground. We got her down with ease.

That completed my random daily heroic and I collected my 70 Valor Points. I didn't win the Chaos Orb but I did go on to run 5 more random heroics in which I won 2 orbs total.

Posted on A World of Warcraft Blog 4/24/11

Random Daily Heroic: Deadmines - 4/22/11

Today my random daily heroic was Deadmines on Wranngar. This dungeon can be kind of tricky if you have a bad group or a group with too many people that aren't familiar with it.  

We had a decent group though so we didn't have many problems. We got through the trash ok then had one person die on the first boss. You have to watch out for the wall of fire, it really hurts. This fight can be tough on melee fighters because you have to be so close to him when the wall of fire is centered on him. We got him down anyway without any problem.

We cleared some more trash and made our way to the next boss in the workshop. We had no problems in there, we cleared the two trash mobs, killed the boss' lackey, then killed the boss.

We cleared the trash from there to the foundry. The foundry is where things can, and usually do, go bad. We "converted" the mobs down below then engaged the boss. As usual we fought him on the ramp. As a melee this can be a tough fight because of the AoE's he does. I made sure to run away every time I saw him casting one of them. The tank died at one point but I battle rezz'd him with 100% health and got him back into the fight. We got that boss down without any more deaths.

We cleared some more trash and made our way onto the boat. Ripsnarl is the first boss you have to fight on the boat and possibly the hardest too. We didn't have any problem with him this time though and got him down. Some people like to tank him inside the cabin there but I don't think that is a good idea. If you tank him inside you have to get out very fast when he dies or Cookie will spawn on top of you and you have to go from one boss fight into another. That is kind of stressful on the healer as the Cookie fight can be heals heavy. I have seen it happen more than once.

We got Cookie out of the way after that and then it was time for Vanessa. We did the nightmares part and lost 3 people in the beams. That can be tricky but it has been a long time since I have died on that part. We got the dead rezz'd and headed in to save the family. It was rezzing the dead that did us in, we wiped on the last mob before Vanessa when the time ran out. When we got back we took down Vanessa without any problem and completed the dungeon.

I got my 70 Valor Points and also won the Chaos Orb which was pretty nice. I did a couple more randoms after that and won one more orb.

Originally posted on A World of Warcraft Blog on 4/23/11

Random Daily Heroic - Blackrock Caverns 4/20/11

Today I got Blackrock Caverns for my random daily heroic on Wranngar. This instance isn't too bad as long as you have a decent group that knows how to do the second boss.

After clearing a couple groups of trash we were ready to take down the first boss, Rom'ogg Bonecrusher. This boss has a few moves but the most dangerous is the binding chains he puts on you and the skullcracker he does immediately afterwards. It is very important that you dps down the chains as fast as you can so you have time to get away before he does the skullcracker. We wiped on this boss because someone got too close to a group of mobs the tank didn't clear, sloppy playing combined with sloppy clearing. After we got by this boss we cleared some more trash which brought us to Corla, Hearld of Twilight.

This is where a group has to work together. I have seen so many wipes trying to take this boss down because people don't know what they are doing. It is not a hard boss, but everything has to be done right. You need three people to block the beams. As you are blocking the beam you are building up stacks, you need to step out of the beam when you hit 80 stacks. I usually start moving around 75 stacks. You stay out of the beam until the stacks wear off then step right back into the beam. Repeat this until the boss is down. Simple. I have seen so many wipes on this boss.

Some more trash brings you to Karsh Steelbender. Simple boss. Just run him through the fire once in awhile and dps him down. DPS goes up as the stacks do so you can burn this boss down pretty fast.

Once you have Steelbender down you have some more trash to get you to Beauty. Beauty has 2 smaller dogs with her, Lucky and I think the other one's name is Buster or Spot. There is also Runty in the back but you don't need to deal with him. Use some kind of CC on the two smaller dogs, remembering to refresh it once in awhile, and take the boss down, pretty easy stuff.

A little more trash brings you to the last boss, Ascendant Lord Obsidius. He will have 3 "followers" with him that someone in the group will have to kite. I have found it pretty easy to kite them in Bear form on my Druid, with my Hunter and it looks like Mages can do it easily also. Once in awhile during the fight he will switch places with one of his "followers" so whoever is kiting will need to pick that one up while the dps switches back to the boss. Usually not a hard fight.

I completed this as my daily and received my 70 Valor Points as well as winning the Chaos Orb. I now have 17 Chaos Orbs in stock, I think it is time to make something.

Originally posted on A World of Warcraft Blog on 4/21/11

Random Daily Heroic - Shadowfang Keep 4/19/11

I got Shadowfang Keep as my random daily heroic again today on Wranngar.

I got lucky and got another great group again today. We burned right through the place taking out all bosses on the way. There were two deaths this time, both the same person, an undergeared Shadow Priest. That was not the Healers fault though, the Priest had low health and a noticeable lack of experience. SFK is one of the dungeons that on normal is really low level and then level 85 on heroic so that happens from time to time. I know it has changed dramatically since I did it on normal when my toons were low level. They changed some of the low level dungeons around for cataclysm and then made a strictly heroic version for 85's.

The first death was at the first boss, Baron Ashbury, which is understandable. The first boss does a move called asphyxiate that brings you down to literally around 1 HP so it is easy to lose someone there or even wipe. He has a few other moves but most of them are interruptable.

The Tank on this run didn't pull the large mobs from outside to the inside so we could fight them, we fought them outside in the courtyard which is unusual. The problem you can have doing that is someone getting feared into other mobs but we got through it without that happening.

We made our way into the kitchen/dining area, took out the trash, and killed the second boss, Baron Silverlaine. That has always seemed like an easy fight to me on heroic.

The next boss in the lineup is Commander Springvale. He can be pretty tough as he has a few moves that deal up some good damage. He main attacks are Word of Shame, Malefic Strike, Desecration and Shield of the Perfidious. A lot of groups will skip this boss or wipe on him a couple times and skip him but the last couple groups I have been in have taken him down without a problem. This was the second and last death for the Shadow Priest.

Next was Lord Walden. He has a couple of toxic attacks that can deal out a lot of damage. There are a couple simple rules to remember for his toxic attacks. Green keep moving, Red don't move. Pretty simple. We had no problem with this boss. This is where I topped 15k dps yesterday, today I did 14.8k, not bad but not 15k either lol.

The last boss in this dungeon is Lord Godfrey. This is a boss that a group is either going to be able to work together on and get down fast or wipe on a few times and get him down eventually if the group doesn't fall apart. It takes some coordination and quick wits to get through this boss.

Lord Godfrey has a few attacks starting with Pistol Barrage. That is when he will fire a pistol barrage which fires out in a cone from the boss inflicting 27000 shadow damage a second to anyone inside the cone and lasts for six seconds.

His next attack is Summon Bloodthirsty Ghouls which will summon six ghouls over three seconds.

Probably his most lethal attack is Cursed Bullets which is a curse he will put on a target. This can be interrupted but has a one second cast time. This curse lasts 15 seconds with the damage increasing over time. The last five ticks of this curse will hit you for 10k, 20k, 30k, 40k and 50k damage, that's 150k damage over five seconds. This curse needs to be dispelled as soon as possible. Today we had a Paladin Healer who can not remove curses so I had to decurse on that one. If you are going to remove this curse you will have to have a Druid or Shaman in the group. Mages might be able to remove curses too, I'm not sure.

His last attack is Mortal Wound that he will put on the tank. This attack causes 1500 damage per second and reduces healing received by 10% for eight seconds, this is stackable.

We got him down pretty quick and easy getting me my 70 Valor Points and the Chaos Orb. It was a pretty easy win for the orb today, I was the only one who could roll on it. I found out after I left the dungeon and went to sell my loot that I had won just about every roll in there including the two items the last boss dropped plus the Chaos Orb. A lucky day for me.

Originally posted on A World of Warcraft Blog - 4/19/11

Feeling Crabby? - Random Daily Cooking Quest 4/19/11

Today the daily cooking quest from Robby Flay (50,71) in Stormwind City was Feeling Crabby?.

This one had me heading to the canals in Stormwind to catch 10 Canal Crabs. I used to think Cheese for Glowergold in Dalaran was hard because the Half Full Dalaran Wine Glasses were so small and hard to target but these are small and moving so it is even worse.

I jumped in the canal on Wranngar and switched to swim form, so I wouldn't have to keep surfacing for air, and started swimming around. The Canal Crabs are just wandering around and you have to click on them like you are looting them. It only takes a few minutes to get the 10 you need if there are not a lot of people doing the daily at the same time. If there are it can take awhile.

Today there was no one else doing it so I got it done in a few minutes. Once I had the 10 Canal Crabs I needed I headed back over to Robby Flay to turn them in. Today he gave me 9g40s and 2 Chef's Awards. I would have also gotten +1 to my cooking skill if my cooking skill wasn't already maxed at 525. I am only doing this now for the Chef's Awards so I can buy the rest of the Cataclysm cooking recipes.

Originally posted on A World of Warcraft Blog

Random daily Heroic - Shadowfang Keep 4/18/11

I had a little trouble getting my random daily heroic done on Wranngar today, they kept restarting the server half way through. I started a Deadmines run only to have it reset half way through Ripsnarl. I started a Stonecore only to have it reset before the first boss. Finally I got into a Shadowfang keep that I was able to finish.

My dps started off slow in SFK, it usually does when I first enter an instance. Once I got rolling it was ok though. By the time we got to the first boss I was in my groove. We got the first boss down without any trouble. This boss can be kind of scary. I can't imagine what people must think when they are in there for the very first time on heroic, especially the healer. The boss does this thing called strangulation which incapacitates everyone and brings their health down to about 1 HP. I remember the first time I did it, I figured we were going to wipe.

We did all the bosses on this run and I got an achievement out of it. On the next to the last boss, Lord Walden, my dps passed 15k which is a personal best for me on Wranngar. I was a little surprised it happened on that boss as you have to run around when he does certain attacks and that usually reduces your dps.

As I was the only one able to decurse, I had to decurse on the last boss. The last boss has a curse he puts on you called Cursed Bullets. This curse will do a lot of damage if not removed. The last five ticks of this curse will hit for 10k, 20k, 30k, 40k and 50k, hitting you for 150k damage in five ticks. I know I don't have 150k HP to spare or 150k HP for that matter. We got the last boss down without a problem to complete my daily random.

I won the Chaos Orb along with collecting my 70 Valor Points. That enabled me to get my new 359 cloak, Viewless Wings. That cost me 1250 Valor Points. The next item I will be getting is a relic for 700 Valor Points. That will take me 10 days of randoms to get.

Random Daily Heroic - Vortex Pinnacle 4/17/11

Today my daily random heroic dungeon for Wranngar was Vortex Pinnacle. I did it with 2 other guild members, both dps, so we had to pug the healer and tank.

We ended up getting a good Warrior tank and Druid Healer so things went well. My dps was in top form for this one and I was leading for most of the dungeon. On the second boss, Altairus I hit 20k dps with the buff you get from standing upwind. That topped the next highest by almost 10k.


We didn't have any problems with this run, it was textbook and smooth and I got my 70 valor points but lost the Chaos Orb to a guild member. I also lost the next Chaos Orb to the same guild member but got the one after that.

I ended up running a total of four heroic dungeons last night, getting one Chaos Orb and losing on three of them. That is not too bad, I have 12 Chaos Orbs now and that is enough to make a few pieces of gear. I will be getting my new cloak, Viewless Wings, tomorrow after I complete my daily heroic.