I've basically gotten bored again. Still playing some on my Druid because I hate running heroics as anything except a tank. I'm brainstorming some kind of new project to blog.
Stay tuned...
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Monday, February 8, 2010
The Return of the Shadow Priest
So over the weekend a couple things happened.
First, I did a 25man ToC with my guild. I came as feral DPS and did decent for my gear ~6.5k DPS. But I realized something during the run. I don't enjoy playing melee DPS very much. One of the reasons I "rerolled" druid was because I wanted a class that could tank 5mans, since I get extremely irritated by piss poor 5man tanks, but one that I could have fun DPSing in raids. I never enjoyed ret on my Paladin, but I thought it was because ret's rotation is pretty boring. Cat DPS is more involved and I thought it'd be more interesting for me. It definitely is a difficult class to master and I'm far from mastering it, but I'm finding that I just don't like melee. Things feel too hectic when I'm up the boss's ass. I prefer the methodical nature of caster DPS. The obvious solution would be to go boomkin, however I find boomkin to be a hideous sight and I can't ever imagine myself playing one.
So while I was considering what I would do next, I figured I'd level my shadow priest some more. If you've read my first blog entry, you'll know that my Shadow Priest was my first ever main. He's who I played when I killed Kael and Vashj and scored a ZA bear. When I had the time to raid 20+ hours a week, it was my priest. My shadow priest was my first love.
So I logged on Tuwei, bought dual spec and cold weather flying and start leveling. I had left him at 73 a while back when I'd play him occasional between raiding on my Paladin. I went with a holy off spec for now just because it's nice to heal the occasional instance while leveling since it doesn't take much effort or energy.
I healed a couple runs, ran a couple quests and then decided to finally queue just as DPS so I could remember what it felt like to melt faces. It felt good!
My priest is still wearing mostly T5 and some heirloom gear. I only ran a couple Hyjal runs before I quit back in the day so I don't have any T6, but I have the sweet pink mace from there. The gear is about on par with level 75-76 blues it looks like but I'm raping damage meters against people whose "gear score" is considered higher than mine. And it's fucking fun. Especially after getting Mind Sear. My experience when tanking is that ret pallies and DKs usually dominate 5man meters. But it really seems like shadow preists have excellent tools for 5mans. Mind Sear is one of the best mass AOE spells in the game, and with multi target dotting, SPs can dominate on 2-3 pulls too. I really can't tell you how fun it is to play my priest again and how many memories it brings back.
I don't know yet whether I'll actually raid on Tuwei when I hit 80 or if this is just a temporary fun little tangent. But I think I might be done with my Druid for now. I know I'm going to miss being able to raid on a consistent schedule when I hit 80 though so there's a good chance the fun will only last until I'm fully geared from badge/heroic gear.
First, I did a 25man ToC with my guild. I came as feral DPS and did decent for my gear ~6.5k DPS. But I realized something during the run. I don't enjoy playing melee DPS very much. One of the reasons I "rerolled" druid was because I wanted a class that could tank 5mans, since I get extremely irritated by piss poor 5man tanks, but one that I could have fun DPSing in raids. I never enjoyed ret on my Paladin, but I thought it was because ret's rotation is pretty boring. Cat DPS is more involved and I thought it'd be more interesting for me. It definitely is a difficult class to master and I'm far from mastering it, but I'm finding that I just don't like melee. Things feel too hectic when I'm up the boss's ass. I prefer the methodical nature of caster DPS. The obvious solution would be to go boomkin, however I find boomkin to be a hideous sight and I can't ever imagine myself playing one.
So while I was considering what I would do next, I figured I'd level my shadow priest some more. If you've read my first blog entry, you'll know that my Shadow Priest was my first ever main. He's who I played when I killed Kael and Vashj and scored a ZA bear. When I had the time to raid 20+ hours a week, it was my priest. My shadow priest was my first love.
So I logged on Tuwei, bought dual spec and cold weather flying and start leveling. I had left him at 73 a while back when I'd play him occasional between raiding on my Paladin. I went with a holy off spec for now just because it's nice to heal the occasional instance while leveling since it doesn't take much effort or energy.
I healed a couple runs, ran a couple quests and then decided to finally queue just as DPS so I could remember what it felt like to melt faces. It felt good!
My priest is still wearing mostly T5 and some heirloom gear. I only ran a couple Hyjal runs before I quit back in the day so I don't have any T6, but I have the sweet pink mace from there. The gear is about on par with level 75-76 blues it looks like but I'm raping damage meters against people whose "gear score" is considered higher than mine. And it's fucking fun. Especially after getting Mind Sear. My experience when tanking is that ret pallies and DKs usually dominate 5man meters. But it really seems like shadow preists have excellent tools for 5mans. Mind Sear is one of the best mass AOE spells in the game, and with multi target dotting, SPs can dominate on 2-3 pulls too. I really can't tell you how fun it is to play my priest again and how many memories it brings back.
I don't know yet whether I'll actually raid on Tuwei when I hit 80 or if this is just a temporary fun little tangent. But I think I might be done with my Druid for now. I know I'm going to miss being able to raid on a consistent schedule when I hit 80 though so there's a good chance the fun will only last until I'm fully geared from badge/heroic gear.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
334: Vault of Archavon
Yesterday I finally got to try to new boss in VoA.
First I tanked 10man. Our group tried two healing it which caused us to wipe once but we got it on the second try pretty easily. As a tank the fight's extremely easy, you just taunt back and forth with the other tank at 3-4 stacks while making sure to let your debuff fall off. You'll want to pull him toward the back of the room some to give DPS room to spread out and kill the orbs that spawn.
Later I got to join a group as kitty DPS. They said "5k minimum" DPS. 5k is pretty low in a 25man and I was confident I'd be fine but I still don't have a full cat set - had to use my tanking cloak and one tanking trinket. Before I joined the group I had been practicing on a target dummy and was consistently between 4.1k-4.3k. Since raid buffs make a huge difference, especially for crit levels which cats are extremely dependent on I knew I'd be a lot higher in a raid.
Before we pulled the new boss, the raid leader said "If we wipe and anyone's low on DPS I'm going to boot you. If two people are rolling on the same item and one person is at least 2k DPS higher than the other person, I'm giving it to them." Again, DPSing is easy and people are idiots so I thought even with my sub par gear I'd be okay. But since I'd never really DPS'd on my Druid before I was a little nervous.
We pulled once and wiped because tanks didn't pull him back far enough and DPS were dying. But it was a fast wipe so not enough to really judge DPS. Our second pull went fine and the fight was simple enough. I was pleased to see myself #5 for DPS at 6.4k. This isn't exactly worthy of flexing my epeen, but for only having about 50% crit unbuffed, under 1k ArP, a tanking cloak and one tanking trinket, I thought it was solid. The cat "rotation" is also starting to feel a lot less awkward - it helps when you have a warrior to keep up the 30% bleed debuff.
I didn't end up getting any loot from any of the bosses but the extra frost badges were nice. And it was good to see that my DPS is coming along. I think gear is holding me back more than skill at this point. There's definitely still room for me to improve but I'm getting decent uptimes on rip/rake now (I'll start posting WoLog reports soon). And when I get some more gear - particularly the trinket from H FoS things will really start coming together.
One final thought - I'm considering getting some the i245 DPS craftables made. Crusader orbs are going for a cheap 160g nowadays and they'd be HUGE upgrades. The main thing holding me back is that even 10m ICC has drops better than them. My DPS doesn't seem to be too terrible but we'll see. The higher gear score will make it easier to get into pugs so that's something to consider.
First I tanked 10man. Our group tried two healing it which caused us to wipe once but we got it on the second try pretty easily. As a tank the fight's extremely easy, you just taunt back and forth with the other tank at 3-4 stacks while making sure to let your debuff fall off. You'll want to pull him toward the back of the room some to give DPS room to spread out and kill the orbs that spawn.
Later I got to join a group as kitty DPS. They said "5k minimum" DPS. 5k is pretty low in a 25man and I was confident I'd be fine but I still don't have a full cat set - had to use my tanking cloak and one tanking trinket. Before I joined the group I had been practicing on a target dummy and was consistently between 4.1k-4.3k. Since raid buffs make a huge difference, especially for crit levels which cats are extremely dependent on I knew I'd be a lot higher in a raid.
Before we pulled the new boss, the raid leader said "If we wipe and anyone's low on DPS I'm going to boot you. If two people are rolling on the same item and one person is at least 2k DPS higher than the other person, I'm giving it to them." Again, DPSing is easy and people are idiots so I thought even with my sub par gear I'd be okay. But since I'd never really DPS'd on my Druid before I was a little nervous.
We pulled once and wiped because tanks didn't pull him back far enough and DPS were dying. But it was a fast wipe so not enough to really judge DPS. Our second pull went fine and the fight was simple enough. I was pleased to see myself #5 for DPS at 6.4k. This isn't exactly worthy of flexing my epeen, but for only having about 50% crit unbuffed, under 1k ArP, a tanking cloak and one tanking trinket, I thought it was solid. The cat "rotation" is also starting to feel a lot less awkward - it helps when you have a warrior to keep up the 30% bleed debuff.
I didn't end up getting any loot from any of the bosses but the extra frost badges were nice. And it was good to see that my DPS is coming along. I think gear is holding me back more than skill at this point. There's definitely still room for me to improve but I'm getting decent uptimes on rip/rake now (I'll start posting WoLog reports soon). And when I get some more gear - particularly the trinket from H FoS things will really start coming together.
One final thought - I'm considering getting some the i245 DPS craftables made. Crusader orbs are going for a cheap 160g nowadays and they'd be HUGE upgrades. The main thing holding me back is that even 10m ICC has drops better than them. My DPS doesn't seem to be too terrible but we'll see. The higher gear score will make it easier to get into pugs so that's something to consider.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Opinion: Gearing from Pugging
My previous post included my current gear list that I obtained almost entirely from 5mans. I thought I'd do another post that replaced the few raid items I'd gotten with gear from badges/5mans. Now, I haven't looked closely enough to insure that this is truly a "BiS 5man" list, but it's very close. There are possibly upgrades to the i200 items on the list but this is a set that's good enough to past most raid pug's gear checks.
Keep in mind that there are quite a few easy to obtain upgrades to this list that can be snagged from very puggable raids such as Onyxia, ToC 10, and even Ulduar. This should serve as just a baseline for what you can go after while pugging.
Here's a wowhead profile of my recommended gear: http://www.wowhead.com/?profile=20771511
Note that you're easily hit capped, but still about 3% away from dodge capped on expertise. This is definitely acceptable as feral cat is one of the few specs where hit and expertise aren't always your best stats below the cap. You also get the 2pc T9 which is pretty good and sit at 531 ArP without any procs. This is low, but again all this gear is obtainable from badges or 5mans so that number will shoot up as you start doing raids. The idol is the frost badge one, but any of the other idols are decent too.
Keep in mind that there are quite a few easy to obtain upgrades to this list that can be snagged from very puggable raids such as Onyxia, ToC 10, and even Ulduar. This should serve as just a baseline for what you can go after while pugging.
Here's a wowhead profile of my recommended gear: http://www.wowhead.com/?profile=20771511
Note that you're easily hit capped, but still about 3% away from dodge capped on expertise. This is definitely acceptable as feral cat is one of the few specs where hit and expertise aren't always your best stats below the cap. You also get the 2pc T9 which is pretty good and sit at 531 ArP without any procs. This is low, but again all this gear is obtainable from badges or 5mans so that number will shoot up as you start doing raids. The idol is the frost badge one, but any of the other idols are decent too.
Monday, February 1, 2010
312: Ready for ICC?
Over the weekend and got a lot of playing in. My tank set is basically done for now. I'm in full epics, mostly i232+ with just a couple i200, i219 left. It's more than enough for heroics and VoA which will be the main places that I'm tanking for pugs. In addition I've almost completed my kitty set as well. I farmed reg ToC5 a bunch last night and finally snagged the ArP trinket. This gives me enough ArP from gear to make it the best stat to gem for, which is a huge step because I was trying to hold off on gemming too much of my kitty gear because I knew I'd have to replace all that agility with ArP pretty soon.
My cat set isn't quite complete though, there are still a couple items that I'm looking for from the new ICC heroics:
Needle-Encrusted Scorpion from FoS. This will be tough because there is almost always one other person rolling on it and I haven't even seen it drop yet.
Band of Stained Souls from PoS.
Choking Hauberk
Barbed Ymirheim Choker from PoS or Broach of the Wailing Night from badges. The Choker is slightly better but if I don't see it drop soon I'll just buy the badge one.
Chewed Leather Wristguards from PoS.
There are a couple other minor upgrades from some of the reg ICC 5mans (upgrading my i200 to an i219 but I don't think they're worth the effort. According to wow-heroes my gear is ready for ICC10 so hopefully I'll start running that and fill in a couple of the worse slots.
Picking up those last few items mentioned above will give me the following profile:
http://www.wowhead.com/?profile=20767916
These items were obtained almost entirely through 5mans. The only exceptions being my weapon (from XT 25) and my gloves (from ToC 10). Both of these have suitable replacements - there's actually a better weapon in H HoR and plenty of decent gloves replacements. There are only a few "bad" items - the cloak and belt are in serious need of upgrades and the boots are "kinda bad". But in general the gear is good enough to progress through the newest content in the game (on a 10 man level) and enough to not contribute some even on a 25man level.
My cat set isn't quite complete though, there are still a couple items that I'm looking for from the new ICC heroics:
Needle-Encrusted Scorpion from FoS. This will be tough because there is almost always one other person rolling on it and I haven't even seen it drop yet.
Band of Stained Souls from PoS.
Choking Hauberk
Barbed Ymirheim Choker from PoS or Broach of the Wailing Night from badges. The Choker is slightly better but if I don't see it drop soon I'll just buy the badge one.
Chewed Leather Wristguards from PoS.
There are a couple other minor upgrades from some of the reg ICC 5mans (upgrading my i200 to an i219 but I don't think they're worth the effort. According to wow-heroes my gear is ready for ICC10 so hopefully I'll start running that and fill in a couple of the worse slots.
Picking up those last few items mentioned above will give me the following profile:
http://www.wowhead.com/?profile=20767916
These items were obtained almost entirely through 5mans. The only exceptions being my weapon (from XT 25) and my gloves (from ToC 10). Both of these have suitable replacements - there's actually a better weapon in H HoR and plenty of decent gloves replacements. There are only a few "bad" items - the cloak and belt are in serious need of upgrades and the boots are "kinda bad". But in general the gear is good enough to progress through the newest content in the game (on a 10 man level) and enough to not contribute some even on a 25man level.
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