Up And Running Again.

Ok quite a bit has been happening over the past couple of days.

High Astromancer Solarian.

I downed High Astromancer Solarian with the guild for the first time (my first time not theirs). In a fight where both the rogues we brought along managed to get themselves killed, leaving me running all over the place stunning and shield bashing the healers and hoping the mages and shaman managed to cover the interrupts that I didn't. In the end we muddled through and brought the lady to her knees. Although it's hard to tell from the pic since she turned into a giant Voidwalker before the end.


Magtheridon.

After that we went and killed Magtheridon again, adding new champions to the guild. And I discovered that with a bit of practice you can dance on the beasties head.


A New Axe.

Then a couple of heroics later I finally manage to get my shiny new axe. (Yay loot for me). Although I must say that it doesn't look that impressive for it's stats, it should look bigger and meaner, basically something that shouts "Stunty Smash!!" before I do.

Mount Hyjal.

Then there was tonight. This was the big one, SoL taking their trial run in Mount Hyjal to take on Rage Winterchill. A last minute decision to take 4 tanks to make the trash waves easier to deal with landed me in the line up.

An hour before the raid I was checking over my gear and consumables, I'd been told to bring my dps gear with me as Rage himself only requires one tank. So there I was going over my two sets of gear making sure every thing was there and setting up my Outfitter addon to switch me into the right gear for the boss fight. Ok I've got the right armor, I've got the right weapons, I've got the right ... oh crap.

Try as I might I could not find my Medallion of the Alliance, all I could find was my Insignia of the Alliance, which I though I had destroyed. Then it strikes me, I did destroy a pvp trinket, only I must have destroyed the wrong one. /facepalm

I immediately contacted one of the higher-ups and informed them of my problem, they told me that it should be alright since I would have to be very unlucky to be hit by two of the frostbolts. Ok I'm still going this time, but it means I have to grind the honor for the Medallion all over again :(

I arrive early to the instance as is my habit, and a couple of others are there already too. I'm doing a bit of exploring when I find this lovely little bathing spot just before the instance. So I strip off and have a bit of a soak, after seeing me in there Lady B decides to join me.


As more people start arriving it soon fills up. Oh and Lady B got the credit for finding it as it was claimed that only she could find a bath before a raid.


Our relaxation over we get started ... well after a much longer than normal set up period since this was a completely different kind of encounter than we were used to. It's much like comparing a normal 5 man instance to the Black Morass.

Rage Winterchill Take 1.

We deal with the trash, it gets a bit hectic but we manage, the only problem was that we didn't have enough time for people to switch to their pvp trinket before the boss came. I managed to switch into my dps gear but in my panic over having a sub standard pvp trinket had forgotten to set outfitter to equip it. /facepalm ... again.

Frostbolts and Death and decay run rough shod all over the raid. and we end up face down on the ground and let Lady Proudmore do her own dirty work. It turns out shes not so tough without 25 people protecting her. (oh and I've pointed myself out taking it easy in the Death and Decay, just in case you missed me)


It was at this point we lost a great off hand fist weapon because the master looter died before he could distribute it. This I'm sure brought tears to the eyes of the enhance shammy who would have received it. /comfort

Rage Winterchill Take 2

We changed the looting and organized the cc more for this attempt, but that was to be our downfall. Getting used to group loot in the middle of a battle was hard enough, I even clicked need and won a tailoring pattern *blush* I'm just glad it wasn't BoP. Also we had so much CC going that we weren't killing the mobs fast enough and a wipe happend as these things do.

Rage Winterchill Take 3

We reduced the number of CC since the hunters were having a hard time finding a bob to drag off to the npc's, who would then get involved in the affray.

Once you get used to the organized chaos these trash waves are it's actually a fun time to be an off tank. You grab your big nasty, drag it into the AoE storm, pick up a second one if you can. Keeping two off the pally tank for any length of time is reasonably hard, especially when the single target dps are focusing fire on your main target.

Anyway you tank your mob/s, and grab any that get loose from the AoE storm thats happening on your head, and snag any that happen to somehow be beating on the squishies. By the way, those of you who did, running past me was a great idea. Nothing draws my attention more than a bouncing priest or mage rushing by with a mob in tow, a quick taunt and the problem is solved.

So this time we tear the trash to pieces in short order, and it's boss time. This time everyone has their PvP trinket on and has decided that standing in Death and Decay is a bad idea. We get Lady Proudmore involved in the fight and all of a sudden it's boss down and SoL goes 1/5 in Mount Hyjal. Cheers and dancing all round, it's piccy time.


In case you were wondering, that little black ball is the remains of Rage. Oh, and guys, more funky outfits are needed, I know some of you have made the effort, but we need more. p.s. we made the boomkin stand off to one side since he was getting a bit wiffy after all that excitement, the lesson here is that feathers are not appropriate attire for a heavy workout.

Anetheron.

We decide to give ourselves a taste of the next boss on our Hyjal list. We have no problems what so ever with the trash waves, having had lots of practice now. The boss himself wasn't so bad either, but those damn infernals he drops are a nightmare. Looks like we will be having a fire resist tank for next time. Also Lady Proudmore was getting a bit pushy and ordering us around every two minutes, so we decided to relax and let her do the work (thats my excuse anyway).

To whoever that druid is sorry for putting words in your mouth, but thats what I would have been asking looking at that chaos. :)

So until next time this is Stuntyone the Incompetent Warrior signing off.

Delays

Delays in posting due to technical difficulties.

Please check back later

Finally The Curse Is Broken.

Ok So I Noobed It Up.

We all knew this was going to happen, come on admit it. The Incompetent Warrior deciding on the spur of the moment to go fury? Sounds like a recipe for mistakes to me if ever I heard one.

Turns out that in my quick reserch I misread about main and off hand weapons, it turns out the Main hand is supposed to be the slow one /facepalm.

Oh well we live and learn. I also got advice that if rage wasn't a problem I should use two slow weapons for extra damage on Whirlwind, which makes sense when you think about it considering the both weapons hit when you Whirlwind.

I addition I was advised that I could greatly increase my dps in arms by switching to swords instead of axe's. as soon as I get an appropriate sword I'm going to test in-raid dps and weigh up the added dps of swords vs the fact that I really really love axe's.

I mean I could yell "Stunty Smash!!" while carrying a sword, but would it really be the same?

I submit to you that it is not.

Anyway many tests in the pipe line so stay tuned for more mistakes and light theory crafting.

Until next time this is Stuntyone the incompetent Warrior signing off.

Fury, Title, Nightbane, And More.

First off ... YAY YAY YAY YAY YAY YAY

The title I have been going on about for so long is finally mine Muhahahahhahahahahahha!!!


Ok now that thats out of the way I can get on with the post.

On thursday I went on my usual karazhan run, having realized that I had never specced Fury in my more than one year of playing wow as a warrior, I decided to give it a go. I settled on a cookie cutter 17/44/0 spec with a fast main hand and a slow off hand weapon. The difference in dps style distracted me from how well the the group was doing, that and there was the usual laughter and talk of spanking and nipples that usually accompanies our raids. We tore through Attumen and Moroes with equal ease. So well in fact that I failed to notice that our off tank DC'd right after the pull on Moroes.

I was to die for the one and only time that night on the Maiden. The damn temperamental lady, was throwing lots of damage my way and I had forgotten to equip the correct healing potions to my action bar. Idiocy tends to kill me more often than anything else.

We go and beat up the Big Bad Wolf, then we're off to trounce the Curator. It was at this point I find the one downside to being fury specced, there are times when you become a threat bomb. I was critting so fast and often in that fight that most of the time I spent just auto attacking the big guy.

As usual we call it a night after downing the Curator, it's an almost natural stopping point in Karazhan since he and the next boss has so many mobs between them. Then someone pipes up with "So when are we going to kill Nightbane?" and I instantly jump on this bandwagon. I hadn't asked about Nightbane before in our raids since I didn't want to side track the raid for my own benefit. The OT asks if we want to go wipe on Nightbane to give everyone a taste of the encounter for next time. I disagree and say we should just one shot him. So off we go to visit the undead dragon.


As you can see I had disguised myself as a pirate just in case Prince has been sharing his prejudice against a certain axe wielding Dwarf we all know with the other Karazhan bosses. The disguise and the fact I was duel wielding swords must have worked because he made no more than a cursory attempt to kill me. We preformed exceedingly well, killing a (for some of us) brand new boss without a single death.

With this done all that was left for me to do was to drop the Earthen Signet and the Fiery Signet back to that naga guy in heroic Slave Pens, and collect my title. which as you can see from my opening lines I did today.

After doing heroic slave pens today (and to all of you who ran the crazy fury warrior through SP, thank you) and riding the high of my new title I went and did the daily heroic which was Shattered Halls, with almost exactly the same group. Which we completed, even doing the time trial and scoring an additional BoJ. This put me only 31 badges away from my shiny new axe.

All Hail King Stunty!Do you think my throne is too big?

Anyway that about wraps it up for tonight ... oh wait I nearly forgot.

Initial Views On 17/44/0 Fury.

After my so far limited experience with this spec I still cannot write a full review of it, but my initial thoughts are that it provides much more easily attained good personal dps than 33/28/0, but lacks the utility of the other spec. Although this is mitigated some what in 5 man groups and 10 man raids, by the low number of physical damage dealers you are likely to run with. This is leaning me towards recommending this spec prior to 25 man raiding, further testing is required but stay tuned for a full review of the spec.

So until next time this is sStuntyone the Incompetent Warrior signing off.

Disregard my last post :)

My kara team just had a flawless run from the front door to curator ... then to top things off we go and one shot nightbane :)

Full story tomorrow

A Bit About My Kara Team.

I just wanted to talk a bit about my Karazhan group, they just don't get enough love on my blog :)

It is lead and organized by a husband and wife duo, and we are just in it as they say "for teh lulz". I think this exert from the groups thread on my guilds forum says it all really.



On a side note, we're not usually running kara with something even resembling an ideal setup. We do Moroes without priests of any kind, Aran and Illhoof without locks (even got a nub pally healer that didn't know where to stand and hardly healed anyone before he died and spent rest of the aran fight facedown). And yes, for all those just in it for the loot and the badges: we're not close to clearing kara in one night. And proud of it, as well :)

On the other hand, we usually bring dps warrior, ret pally and any other "frowned upon" spec/class are more than welcome. If it's fun to play, the mood of the raid is so much better. We're about fun and laughs, mages getting lost, aggroing skipped mobs, dying, running back and aggroing the same mobs again, tank running into the same mobs, getting other tank to heal while rest of raid runs back before finally wiping on second group of skipped adds suddenly aggroing. :)



This is why I love running with this group, it's all about having a laugh instead of farming badges and getting loot. It's also the reason I don't have my champion title. I could go off and slip in with one of the other groups to do nightbane, hell even my Friends from my last guild have said that anytime I want I can join them to kill nightbane (whom they are farming like he was corn), but doing that would mean that I would have to spen a whole week without playing in this group ... and to me no title is worth that :)

So until next time this is Stuntyone the Incompetent Warrior signing off.

The Polls Are In.

The votes have been counted and it's been decided.

39 of you wanted me to make "How not to" guides.
3 of you didn't want me to bother at all (2 of these people were me).
3 of you wanted me to make "How to" guides.

This means that I'm going to have to go out and buy proper recording and editing software, so long paycheck.

What I am going to do is wait until I'm in a position where you get a better view than 5-10 minutes of raid boss knee (that's the usual tanking view). I will narrate these in my style (if it can be called such a thing), pointing out what I think are the key features of the encounter for melee dps and tanks. Hopefully you wont hate these too much, or tease me about my messed up accent (to non Americans it sounds American and to Americans it sounds like god knows what, but defiantly not American).

So until next time this is Stuntyone the now much poorer Incompetent Warrior signing off.

He Does It Again!

Thats right folks the Incompetent Warrior has done it again, wiped the raid that is. And I did it in a no nonsense completely my fault kind of way. Now that I have your attention I suppose you'll want to know the where and the how of it. Well they say a picture is worth a thousand words to for the where let me present you with this.


Thats right, Al'ar the big canary in Tempest Keep. Now you know the where lets move on to the how.

Well you see that shield in my hand?

Yep, I was tanking again.

But how exactly did I do it?

Was it the good old standing too far back on the platform? ... nope.

Was it the falling off the edge while tanking the birdie? ... nope.

Was it failing to move my short dwarven ass fast enough when Al'ar was going to Fire Quill? ... Darn tootin' it was.

It was horrible, I was just too slow in dropping off the edge of the platform, which consigned the raid to a slow death by Flame Buffet ... and I got every last one of the buggers too. No escape for you guys when Stunty messes up, oh no. Oh well, I guess if your going to mess up you might as well do it in a big way :).

Oh but the mistakes don't end there, oh no. The best is yet to come, but at least this time it didn't wipe the raid.

This remind you of my last Al'ar post? It should because it's almost and exact copy of the pic I posted there. You want to know something? This happened not once but twice in the same fight.

The first time was completely my own fault. My key bindings for my Intercept macro and my Intervene skill are right next to each other and guess which one I hit while I still had the Melt Armor debuff on me. Thats right stunty shoots across the room right into a crushing blow from Al'ar that was meant for the current tank, hello Splatsville population me.

Fortunately for me a very nice druid threw me a Battle Rez and I was up and cooking again. Al'ar must have thought I looked better on the ground because the next time I was tanking him and just before my Shield Block cooldown was up ... well let me just show you the appropriate part of the combat log.

21:08'19.956 Stuntyone is afflicted by Melt Armor
21:08'20.200 Al'ar's Swing hits Stuntyone for 15388 Physical (crushing)
21:08'21.124 Stuntyone Dies

Thats right, in less than half a second he hit me with melt Armour and slapped me with the death blow. *sigh* I think this guy has it in for me.

That about covers all my major mistakes of the night ... Oh we also did Void Reaver, Loot Reaver, Lol Reaver, whatever you want to call him. Let me tell you it is without a doubt the most boring boss you will ever face while tanking. Just trust me on that one, it must get a little bit more exciting for the ranged dps and healers, because they at least have to move around a bit, but for the tanks and melee it's just snoozeville.

Oh and why isn't this on his loot list?

So until next time this is Stuntyone the Incompetent Warrior Signing off.

How To Find Out About The People You Play With.

Tonight we went back to SSC to do Fathom Lord Karathress. We had downed him before, and last time it only took two attempts, this time however was to be very different.

I was running as a tank again for this one, but K could make it this time so the threat of tanking anything serious was removed (much to my relief). We had only planned on killing Karathress and taking a peak at Lady Vashj, which was a good thing considering how the night turned out.

It took just under 2 hours (from buffing up to pull the trash) and 7 attempts to kill Karathress and his cohorts. Now surprisingly this was not a bad thing for me. It let me see how the core of our raiding team handled this sort of thing. The answer was really bloody well. I've stated before that I don't get wipe aggro (frustration from repeated death's), and it turns out that neither do most of the raiders I run with. Most weren't complaining and the rest were actively joking about the whole affair, even on wipe 6. This I found to be a very pleasant revelation and reminded me how lucky I am to be in this guild.

Here he is finally put to rest.

Then we went for a sneak peak at Lady Vashj, just to get a taste of things to come. We didn't have any real plan just wanted a taste of the encounter. We actually managed to get two of the shield beams down in phase two before wiping. Below is a comment someone came out with as we were about to start the encounter.

When it was confirmed that we would wipe Seb the hunter Feigned Death and then claimed afterwards that he "Had faced Lady Vashj and lived."

Oh I almost forgot to mention my latest bit of loot.

So until next time this is Stuntyone the Incompetent Warrior signing off


For the attention of Banshee: The red team had a great night last night one shotting Netherspite on their first try and then going 2/6 in ZA. the night before blue team downed the prince and got some nice loot. thats bout all the news I con think of from the CoT.