Lunar Festival Super Spy

The Lunar festival is going on right now. Most of my toons already have all the coins they need. However, Khyrie does not. She's missing just about everything. Well she was two weeks ago anyway. Now, she's got half the dungeon coins, most of Kalimdor, all the Horde capital cities, and all of the outside Northrend coins. She's also leveled up to 81, mostly through exploration and coin xp.

Before next Saturday she's got to get to level 82 so that she can get the Deepholm coins, but all the other Cata coins are reachable via flying. Hopefully doing the Northrend dungeon coins will help with the xp for leveling.

The other hard part will be getting the Alliance capital cites coins. Khyrie is currently missing Ironforge and Stormwind. The Darnassus coin was amusing to get.

~~~~~~~~

A guard's arrow whizzed through the air where Khyrie had been as she banked sharply left. The quick direction change was lucky but not entirely planned. Khyrie needed to land somewhere to remove the arrow and heal the wound in her left wing/arm. Fortunately the trees and branches of Teldrassil gave her many options that were both large enough for her troll form and far enough away from any guards on the ground.

Once healed, Khyrie shifted back into bat form and headed towards Darnassus. She soared above the road, the wind whispering in her claws. Once to the Darnassus gate she dove sharply and skimmed above the hill to the side of the main entrance. From there she glided swiftly just above the ground through the Craftsman's Terrace and toward the Cenarion Enclave. She was just fast enough as a bat to out race attacks from the Sentinels at the main gate, and yet not high enough to be noticed by the flying city guards.

With quick and almost silent flaps of her wings Khyrie reached the Cenarion Enclave and the elder standing in a moonbeam there. Swiftly she shifted back to troll form and bowed to the elder. In return the elder's ghostly hands passed her a glowing lunar festival coin and a thick red envelope. She tucked both items into her pack. The envelope was intriguing but it would be better to open that later.

A quick shift later and she was back in bat form and ready to make her escape from Darnassus. She started to look around for the closest exit, but, in her haste, flew a little too high. Suddenly a searing pain pierced her wing membranes. A hippogryph had swooped down from the tree limbs above and savaged her wings. Using what height she had Khyrie dove for the nearby lake. As she plunged into it she shifted into manatee form and swam to the bottom of the lake. Fortunately the hippogryph didn't follow her into the water.

At the bottom of the lake Khyrie alternated between holding her breath as a troll so she could heal herself and shifting back to manatee so she didn't drown. Once fully healed she explored the lake bottom a little bit. It wasn't large, but there were several streams feeding and draining it. Khyrie tried to remember the map of Darnassus she had looked at before this expedition. If she remembered correctly, the stream that drained the lake wasn't actually a stream but a waterfall over the edge of Teldrassil.

Khyrie swam towards the waterfall. She washed over the edge and shifted to bat in midair. A little fancy flying and she was safely out of the waterfall and out of Darnassus and on her way back to Darkshore for the next coin.

~~~~~

Alright so the above story isn't *exactly* correct. There was one death and corpse run while I was grabbing the coin. DraNgNon also gets all the credit for remembering that there is a waterfall out of Darnassus. Other than that it was a pretty speedy and painless coin grab. Far less painful than I'm sure either Stormwind or Ironforge will be.

First, Finest, Last for Mornara

Ikoli the troll priestess had been her first friend. Her shields had kept Mornara safe from harm while Mornara slaughtered all who faced them in Outland. Ikoli was one of the first members of the horde not to flinch when the newly freed Death Knight approached. And that had won her Mornara's lasting friendship. But that memory didn't seem to be the oldest one... there was a hazy memory of a red haired blood elf paladin? Only Mornara was wearing cloth and ordering a demon around? No, that wasn't right, couldn't be right. Mornara killed demons, she didn't control them. And cloth? How laughable, she'd worn plate armor since the first time the Lich King ordered some ghouls to help her get armored and then sent her to Razuvious for instruction in how to runeforge her own weapon.

The male Night Elf had failed the tests to become a Death Knight. He was chained in the center pit of Acherus awaiting his fate. Razuvious gave Mornara the key to his bindings and sent her to kill him to cement the runes on her blade. The Night Elf had a longer reach, but Mornara was fiercer. She pressed him and stayed close so his longer reach was useless. When her sword opened him from collarbone to groin he fell to his knees with a strangled cry and tried to hold his guts in. It wasn't mercy that caused her to kill him swiftly after that. It felt good when she cut his throat.

Arthas was the first leader Mornara followed. That wasn't quite right; Arthas was Mornara's master. She did as he commanded, because he commanded it. Followed implies some sort of choice, but the only choice other than instant and complete obedience was death and torture for her.

Kuanchichi, the elemental troll shaman, had been and still was her finest friend. Shaman and Death Knight plowed through all enemies in their path no matter if it was geists and abominations in Icecrown Citadel, fire elementals on Mt Hyjal, or the twisted spawn of the old gods attacking Wyrmrest temple. Mornara made sure that all their foes focused on her while Kuan dealt immense amounts of damage to them.

It took months of fighting to break the siege on Icecrown Citadel. And once inside it took more months to fight through the hordes of undead minions and the various lieutenants of the Lich King. There were many impressive battles fought and won in those foul halls. But the most important one, was the death of Arthas Menethil, the Lich King. It was a grueling fight, and before it was over they were all almost defeated. But, with help from friends, companions, and Tirion Fordring, Arthas was defeated.

Thrall was the finest leader that Mornara had ever followed. His skill at calling the elements was demonstrated during the retaking of Undercity and again when he helped quiet Azeroth before Deathwing could destroy it. He was wise and calm and thought things through before moving forward with them. And he wanted what was best for the whole Horde individually and as a group.

Eeyan the undead rogue had been her latest companion. They, and a few others, had fought their way through the misguided Zandalari trolls and corrupted Loas of Zul'Gurub. The Gurubashi refugees wisely ignored their party as they rode past in their mechano-hogs. When they did find enemies worth fighting Mornara stood in the front of the group and kept the Zandalari trolls from noticing Eeyan until his weapons were buried to their hilts in troll backs.

An angry earth elemental had been her last kill. The Jewelcrafter in Orgrimmar wanted some help gathering elemental goo. And the druids in Hyjal could always use some help fighting off the waves of summoned elementals the Twilight's Hammer Cult sent at their base in the roots of Nordrassil. So Mornara stepped through the portal and out under the spreading leaves of Nordrassil to cut down earth elementals. At least when they fell she only had to brush gravel off her armor.

The last leader that Mornara had followed... was herself. She had led the guild of Darkfall on their raids since the Shattering. Hellshot, the former leader, had stayed in command of the guild until the end of the campaign in the Firelands, but Mornara had been doing most of the organizational work before than, and she officially took control at that time. It was an odd change for a former member of the Scourge to be not only part of the Horde again, but in command of the group she was with.


Some references.

Blackhorn, Spine, and 5% nerfs

Darkfall killed Spine of Deathwing for the first time on normal mode last night. And, like an idiot, I forgot to take a screen shot. Then again there isn't a whole lot to take a screen shot of, sadly. You get some pretty machinanima, but there is no body for the quite obvious reason that you didn't actually kill Deathwing. All you did was pop a few armor plates off his back so that Thrall could peg him with the Dragon Soul. (How does Thrall do that without frying those of us who just popped the armor off?)

It's a interesting fight. Everyone has to keep on their toes with positioning and damage target. And you had better be ready to get tied down when he rolls. We did it with a single tank and 3 heals. I don't think that one tank would work for 25man, too much damage from corrupted blood, but it did for 10man. I'm not usually a fan of heavy add fights, the adds can be a pain to pickup as the tank. However, since this was *only* adds it wasn't too bad. Though there are a couple of times I wanted to beat the hunters for not warning me that an extra tentacle was about to go down, because my camera was no where near where I could see the Hideous Amalgamation until after it had eaten a healer.

But once you get the hang of things Spine is not a hard fight. It was a whole lot easier then Blackhorn, which we had a lot of trouble with last night. The vast majority of the trouble was due to only having 2 ranged dps in the group. That made it quite difficult to get the drakes down before the boat exploded. But we made a few changes and got the melee to help with the first drake, and it eventually came together.

I'm a little sad that the nerfs are out this early. Because of the holidays I don't feel like we got enough time to work on the raid before it started getting nerfed. We were still making forward progress and I truly think that we could have gotten Spine down with no nerfs. We'd made some great progress the other weekend, and I am pretty sure that even without the nerfs we'd have gotten him this week. But at least the Dragon Soul nerfs are being rolled out a bit at a time. The nerfs to Firelands were horribly discouraging happening in one fell swoop as they did.

It's clear that the DS nerfs are supposed to be comparable to the ICC nerfs of two years ago. (Wow, that was already two years ago...) But I much prefer the way the DS nerfs are being done. It has roughly the same effect, but it's psychologically different to have the bosses nerfed rather than yourself buffed. And oddly I think it might be more of a buff to actually killing the bosses the way the DS buff is going. And for sure it'll keep players from being (as) lazy. You've still got to work at it to put out the damage you expect from yourself, no ICC crazy buff to boost you when you may or may not actually be geared for the instance.

Death Knight Origins

I was chatting with Clariana/Volo the other day and in the course of conversation we got to talking about character origins and endings. Specifically about how our characters became Death Knights and what happened to Volo's characters after the WoW subscription lapsed.

Volo the player has several characters, all with different ends. Clariana lives out her days as a tailor. A shaman stayed in Dalaran for intellectual pursuits. The rogue retires and lives out her life in Orgrimar. Ildiavolo himself put out the rumour that he died in the Firelands so that he could spend the rest of his days meditating on a rock in Orgrimmar. Because he was really messed up in the head after being undead and a death knight servant to Arthas.

This led to discussion about how our DKs became DKs.

Me: So what is the story in your head for how Ildiavolo turned into a death knight?
Volo: He was a rogue that died fighting Illidan. One of his glaives sliced Ildiavolo's jaw off. And when Arthas was gathering bodies he was revived. He was human to start, he died when Illidan and Arthas fought in Warcraft 3.
Volo: How did Mornara become a death knight?
Me: She started out as a warlock. In my head she never actually died, she was just tortured until her mind broke and Arthas used his sword to suck her soul just enough to bind her to his control.
Volo: That's brutal
Me: She'd been a warlock questing around with a certain pally of Kuan's and they split up. Morn went off to the plaguelands to fight the scourge, but it didn't work out so well.
Me: Well she didn't lose her jaw or anything like that!
Volo: I had to explain it somehow!
Me: ;D Wounds from Illidan are cool
Volo: I saw Ildiavolo as being a casualty of war.
Me: I thought of Morn along the same lines, but more along the Roman lines, where the defeated were sold into slavery

But this got me to thinking. I'd never really considered Mornara's origin all that brutal. I mean, yes, she was tortured and then enslaved, so it wasn't a picnic. But she didn't *die*. Her head was majorly fucked with, but she's still alive. She can recover from that. With many scars yes, but still not out of the fight.

Then again, death isn't that great a barrier in Warcraft anyway. There are all sorts of mechanisms for ressurrection. And if that fails there are a bunch of different ways to get zombie-fied. And regardless of zombiefication or torture you're still going to be messed up in the head after it is done.

Spine of Deathwing

This past week Darkfall divided up into two 10mans for our raids. I tried to evenly split up the groups so everyone had heals and ranged/melee dps and a tank and so that people were in the same group as their friends. It's pretty easy to divide groups up, we've actually got a good core crew, but it can be tricky to get everyone with their friends. I could wish that more people would show up, but we're trying to work on recruiting, so hopefully that will fix itself soon.

My group pugged in a dps DK who also had a tank spec, so we made it through the first 5 bosses on Tuesday. Thursday we killed Blackhorn with a pug pally tank. Sunday we were missing people so we compressed down to one 10man and tried our hand at Spine of Deathwing.

Spine is an interesting fight. It's deceptively simple to talk about. Explode adds to blast off Deathwing's armor. Once you remove three armor plates you win. But the execution is tricky to coordinate. We're trying it with one tank, and 3 heals. I'm not sure that's the best way, in particular I could see using two tanks. That would certainly help with the swarms of blood near the end. But I think we can work around that by taking time to kill a bunch of blood before we pull another Hideous Amalgamation.

It's also hard to make sure that everyone gets gripped down for the roll. Well it's easy to get gripped down, it's hard to know when to get ungripped. But we had some good learning attempts Sunday night.

Once Upon a time: Viljo

 

Once upon a time a male was born to the Darkspear tribe of trolls.  The witch doctor looked at him and named him Viljo.  He was not strong in body or deft of hand.  Viljo had no affinity for the elements or the spirits or the beasts.  Despite these short comings the Darkspear did not cast him out.  He was intelligent enough that the witch doctor sent him to the mages for training. 

Viljo passed his first tests in the Valley of Trials.  He did well at his studies.  Magic came easily to him, and even though he was not strong he avoided dying by outsmarting his enemies and with not a little luck.  Eventually Viljo was sent to the city of Orgrimmar to learn more and serve the Horde.  Viljo learned much from the wise trolls there.

To learn more of magic Viljo was sent to the Forsaken.  He had to leave the hot sun of Durotar and travel by goblin blimp across the ocean to Tirisfal Glades where Undercity is located.  The dark pine forests and clouds of plague made him uncomfortable initially, but after a little while he grew accustomed to it and learned to accept the undead.  He learned much from the undead about magic.  Viljo also learned that the undead were not always to be trusted, neither in the things they asked him to do nor especially the things they wanted him to consume. 

When his apprenticeship with the undead was done Viljo returned to Kalimdor a wiser troll and a stronger mage.  He went on to help the Horde in The Barrens and further parts of Kalimdor before returning to the Eastern Kingdoms. 

Eventually Viljo became a great mage.  He helped to kill various enemies of the Horde, including Rend, the false Warchief, Thaurissan, Emperor of the Dark Iron Dwarves, and Ragnaros, the Firelord. 

When the portal to Draenor opened again Viljo went through with his friend Kuan'chichi.  Kuan'chichi had been a mentor to Viljo in times past, but now, with lands new to both of them, they explored together.  Viljo and Kuan'chichi fought the new fel orcs in Hellfire Peninsula.  They helped to establish the Darkspear in Zangarmarsh.  They aided the Mok'nathal in Blade's Edge.  They found and proved themselves worthy of the Mag'har, the single uncorrupted tribe of Orcs in Outland, and even helped reunite the Warchief, Thrall, with his family. 

Viljo has recently fallen in with a band of horde who call themselves Darkfall.  This new guild is full of other powerful members of the horde.  And Viljo's best friend Kuanchichi joined them at the same time Viljo did.  As a group they are quite formidable and have been working for the Violet Eye, to help rid Karazhan of it's demonic presence.  Viljo isn't very much a fan of the human's of the Violet eye, he did help kill the mages and summoner's around Dalaran as a young troll, but the greater good of ridding Karazhan of evil is more important. 

Rahlenti, a bear druid, is also Viljo's good friend.  He recently lent Viljo the last thousand gold that Viljo needed to buy his epic mount.  So VIljo made the long journey to Shadowmoon Valley.  There he talked to the Orcs at Shadow moon Village.  For a great deal of gold one of them taught him how to ride swift windriders and other fast flying mounts.  Then Viljo inspected the available mounts.  He could choose red, purple, green or yellow armored tawny windriders.  Viljo thought long and hard about his choice.  He didn't like the look of the yellow or green armor.  So it was a decision between the red and purple ones.  In a recent run of Karazhan, the Curator, a giant arcane guardian, had dropped a powerful staff when killed.  Viljo was lucky enough to be the one to get it.  This staff was purple with blue accents, and almost exactly matched the purple of the windrider's armor.  So Viljo choose that mount. 

VIljo and his compatriots in Darkfall have been helping to keep Karazhan clear for the Violet Eye.  Unfortunately it appears that the humans of the Violet eye are not very competent and despite the fact that Darkfall cleaned the ghosts, demons, mana anomalies, and other denizens of Kara out they came back as soon as Darkfall went away.  So he has been continuing to kill them on a roughly weekly basis. 

Darkfall was also made aware of the Gronn, and their domination of Outland.  So they have been doing their best to kill them.  Only recently was Viljo and Darkfall able to kill the monster Gruul the Dragonslayer.  Vijlo had already killed many of his sons, but it was time for the most powerful gronn to die. 

In recent days Viljo has been made aware of Kael'thas and his occupation of the Naaru's fortress, Tempest Keep.  Viljo went with the other members of Darkfall to test themselves against some of Kael'thas's minions in Tempest Keep.  Unfortunately at this time the Void Reaver is too strong for them.  And Darkfall was forced to retreat. 



The Lich King has awoken and is attacking Orgrimmar.  His agents have left plagued boxes in it and many other capital cities.  So there is a zombie infestation.  There is also an attack force of abominations, ghouls, and frost wyrms attacking the Valley of Honor in Orgrimmar.  Vijlo, and his constant companion and friend Kuanchichi, help to repell these.  And listen as Thrall, Sylvanas, Garrosh, and Saurfang make plans to attack Northrend and the Lich King.  They resolve to aid in any attacks and when Garrosh goes to Borean Tundra in Northrend they take the first available blimp to follow and fight the minions of the Lich King. 

Once in Borean tundra they encounter the Taunka, and the Kalu'ak.  Both of whom they aid.  They also encounter the Kirin Tor and the blue dragonflight.  The Blue dragon flight has vowed to stop all magic use in Azeroth.  And since they both use magic neither of them is enthsued about this plan.  The Kirin Tor plans to stop this as best they can, since they are the main organizational body of mages.  However, the Kirin Tor have very little ethics, and Viljo quickly realized that while they may be mages they are still human.  Viljo refuses to torture a human member of the blue dragonflight that he captures for the Kirin Tor. 

The final thing that Kuan and Viljo did in Borean Tundra was to help the Taunka evacuate from their village.  Between the scourge invasions and the pollution of the new gnome encampment nearby the Taunka felt unable to continue where they were in Borean Tundra.  Viljo and Kuan were escorting a few Taunka to Dragonblight, where there was another Taunka village.  Hopefully that village was in better shape than that in Borean Tundra.  Their escort went well, but upon arriving in Dragonblight they found the other village entirely overrun with Scourge.  They helped the Taunka in Dragonblight attack the Scourge there and free their chief who was being held by the Scourge.  They also attacked the Scourge in Azjol-Nerub, the former Nerubian capital.  After that they, unwilingly, helped the Forsaken apothecaries in Venomspite to make some blight and test it.  Neither Kuan or Viljo trust the Forsaken and especially the Apothecaries, and they wouldn't have helped them except that the commander of Agmar's Hammer sent them. 

Unfortunately, Vijlo and Kuan's instinct regarding the Forsaken was correct.  At the battle of Wrathgate the Forsaken apothecaries betrayed the Horde.  The apothecaries attacked both the horde and alliance.  They did this at the same time that Varimanthas attacked the Undercity.  They betrayal was well planned and Lady Sylvanas barely escaped with her life.  In the aftermath of the battle of Wrathgate, Sylvanas, Thrall, and Vol'jin went to retake Undercity.  Viljo and Kuan helped with this and together they all retook Undercity and killed Varimanthas. 

It seems that Varimanthas had been set as a plant among the Horde all along.  He was trying to open a portal to let his "master" into Azeroth.  It was unclear if that master was Kil'Jaeden or Sargeras.  Either way Kuan and Viljo stopped him. 

However as soon as Varimanthas was defeated.  Varian Wrynn, newly restored King of Stormwind, marched into the throne room of Undercity.  He insulted Thrall and swore to wipe out all the Horde.  Varian foolishly believes that the Horde was responsible for the attack, and is unable to understand that the apothecaries along with Varimanthas betrayed the rest of the Horde.  This understandable started a battle right there, but Jaina froze everyone and ported out the Alliance.  Thrall, who has been working his whole life for peace, almost wept with frustration to see all his work set back. 

Kuanchichi and Viljo continued to journey through Northrend.  They helped establish the Horde and Taunka in Grizzly Hills.  Though they didn't help the humans who were capturing trolls for gladiatorial combat.  The Darkspear may not get along with the Drakkari, but Neither Kuan or Viljo is willing to enslave another troll and send it to almost certain death in the fighting ring. 

So they moved on to Zul'Drak.  There Viljo was horrified to learn that the Drakkari were draining and killing their own animal gods in a futile effort to fight off the Scourge.  They would have been much better to ask their gods for help and fight against the Scourge themselves.  Fortunately the Zandalarians were there to help and direct the effort of freeing the gods that the Drakkari had enslaved. 

Viljo then moved to the Storm Peaks.  He and Kuan thought they were helping to motivate Thorim to reengage with the world, but Loken tricked them.  And Loken had his new and corrupt master, the Old God Yogg-Saron, capture and imprison Thorim.  So Kuan and Viljo worked with the Sons of Hodir to gain their trust.  Finally the Sons of Hodir trusted them enough to send them to the Halls of Lightning to fight Loken.  They went with a couple of friends and Loken was defeated.  They continued to help the residents of the Storm Peaks for a while.  Including more fighting of the Iron Dwarves and other minions of Loken. 

Around this time Viljo and Kuanchichi learned that the dread citadel Naxxramas was becoming more of a danger.  They joined up with a group calling itself Thwarted Destiny.  With Thwarted Destiny they fought the inhabitants of Naxx.  Unfortunately soon Thwarted Destiny grew too much to resemble it's name.  So Kuan and Viljo left it to join Twisted Minds.  Hopefully they do not too much resemble their name.

Viljo and Kuan also journeyed to Ice Crown, the home base of the Lich King.  There they found the Argent Crusade hard pressed by the Scourge.  They fought several battles along side and for the Argent Crusade.  They helped both the Argent Crusade and the Ebon Blade create new bases in Ice Crown.  They also did many quests for the airship Orgrim's Hammer.  Many of these quests helped to explain the back story of how Arthas became part of the Lich King.  These quests were given/narrated by a particularly creepy ghost of a young human boy.  How this young ghost knew all of Artha's deeds and thoughts was not explained, and is worrysome.  The quest chain ended when the ghost boy told Kuan and Viljo that Arthas was going to destroy his frozen heart.  Viljo and Kuan told the knights of the Ebon Blade and Tirion Fordring and his Argent Crusade.  Tirion Fordring ws determined to infiltrate the planned destruction of Arthas's heart.  I think originally he wanted to stop it, but when he actually saw the frozen heart he realized that Arthas really is the Lich King.  Nothing remains of the good man that he once was.  When confronted by Arthas himself Tirion said as much.  And then he struck Arthas's heart himself.  It was actually quite dramatic.  Unfortunately Arthas and his minion's didn't take kindly to this.  So Kuan and Viljo and the rest of the Argent Crusade infiltraitors were about to get annihilated when the Knights of the Ebon Blade showed up.  They fought to Tirion and then put up a death gate so everyone could escape before Arthas recovered from the destruction of his heart. 

Unfortunately Viljo and Kuan found that Twisted Minds did in fact resemble their name.  And, while Viljo and Kuan were able to go with them to defeat Naxxramas and Kel'Thuzad, Twisted Minds was not organized enough to keep things going.  Just as they were thinking of looking for another guild to join Viljo saw some people in Dalaran advertising their newly formed guild.  Viljo talked with Emberstream, a feral druid, who led Deterrence, this new guild.  After some talking Viljo told Kuan about it.  After a bit of research on both their parts and more meetings with the leadership of Deterrence Viljo and Kuanchichi joined. 

With Deterrence they have defeated Malygos and have ventured into Ulduar.  Many of the bosses in Ulduar have fallen to them, and both Kuan and Viljo have improved their gear considerably.  They have also gained the friendship of other members of the guild. 

Viljo has been spending time in Un'goro and Tanaris lately.  Mov'rek the Ravasaur Trainer has returned to Un'goro and is willing to share his knowledge of the Venomhide Ravasaur with those who want to take the time to learn.  Kuan and Viljo got there as soon as they could take the portal from Dalaran. 

Once in Un'goro Viljo had to get poisoned many times by the blood of the Venomhide Ravasaurs.  Only when mov'rek was sure that Viljo had built up an immunity to their poison would he tell Viljo which egg to take from the nest.  But now Viljo has a Ravasaur hatchling.  Mov'rek says that when the baby has shed 20 baby teeth it will be big enough to ride.  So every day Viljo takes the portal to Tanaris and checks on his hatchling.  Usually he wants food, but twice so far the hatchling has wanted searing roc feathers to add to his elbow and knee bands.  After the first time he wanted feathers he grew! And now he is level 5,  who knows what level he will be tonight when Viljo goes to see what needs to be done to collect a 9th baby tooth.

Dragon Soul Progress

Blackhorn

Sunday night two weeks ago Darkfall killed Blackhorn on 10man.

We'd been following a strategy where we tried to burn the drakes as fast as possible. But we kept losing people to all sorts of bad stuff: melee adds charging, purple swirlies big and small, or sapper not dying in time. We'd only gotten to phase 2 twice and while one of those was close to a kill it wasn't really repeatable.

So we changed up the kill priority. Three dps were assigned to the melee adds, and a fourth was to swap and help kill them if we called for them to be burned. Of course everyone was still supposed to swap to the sapper as soon as it appeared. We made sure that there were never more than 2 melee adds up at a time. It drastically cut down on the random amount of death due to charge. Only having two melee adds up at a time also reduced the tank damage a lot. And as a final relief for the healers we told everyone to only hop into a small purple swirly when they were at full health and it was close to them. That increased ship damage a fair amount, but as long as we got every single sapper the boat got low but didn't explode.

Somehow this worked. I can't tell if we were super lucky and happened to be able to kill the last 2 drakes before they could drop off a 4th pair of adds, or if the mechanics were fixed so that we'd only ever get 3 pairs of melee adds. Either way, after the 3rd pair of adds were killed the last drake or two was killed and we pushed through to phase two. We had a couple of snafus with the shockwave and devastating roar. But once people remembered to get out of shockwave while the casters stayed more than 10 yards away from the boss to avoid the silence of the roar the kill went reasonably smoothly.

Zon'ozz

Two weeks ago Tuesday night Darkfall had enough people to do DS25. The first two bosses are pretty easy. We had a wipe on Yor'sahj because people didn't listen and stacked when the boss had the green buff. There were a few people not on vent and that made it pretty hard. Honestly the only thing that saved us was the Yor'sahj addon that DraNgNon found for me a couple of weeks ago. The auto announce for slime kill target and stack/no stack and add kill order of that addon is just fabulous. And I really need to add a vent requirement to my raid advertisement macro.

However, Zon'ozz continues to be a thorn in our side. I do not understand how to control the direction of the ping pong ball. And that consistently fucks us. We've got the damage to kill him. We've got the heals to survive his tank damage and his aoe phase damage. But when the ball goes sideways everything gets screwed. We got him to 4% last night. 4%! But we didn't manage to kill him.

I think that I need to step up and tank him so that he is facing directly away from the ranged camp. I have been reluctant to do that, due to healing considerations. But on 25man both of the tank healers are standing in the melee group anyway so they are close enough regardless of how the boss is pointed. However, if we do that the ranged group can't be too far back, both for healing/dispelling reasons, and so that I have time to get the boss in position if the ball goes sideways.

Either way Zon'ozz makes me want to tear my hair out. We've been so close so often and a seemingly random ball bounce will screw it all up.