Friday, May 12, 2006

Two Dragons and some Owls.

I was finally fortunate enough to be with my guild as we brought down Razorgore again.


As a Shaman, the trick to this fight: Keep an Earthbind Totem down where they tell you. Typically on the corner of the inner checkerboard. Then stay back in your corner near the walls and keep a Tranquil Air Totem down. If you are going to heal someone, you can only heal somebody who is going to kill the thing they are fighting. Heal that Mage or Rogue who is going to kill one of the Orc Mages in there. Don't heal the Priest! Because if you get healing aggro you're probably dead. Priests can fade. Shamans can't. ALWAYS keep your Earthbind Totem down. Tranquil Air really appears to help. Heal in a way to stay alive.

That's what I did. Lived to tell about it.

Then off we went to Vael's room. This fight was still tough. Kicked our butts a few times I can assure you. And then I tried something different. I was always putting heals on my party. I'm not in a Tank's party so didn't worry so much as them. We take a steady stream of damage from Vael so I was spending a lot of time healing party mates. I occasionally threw a heal on a tank or a random person. Remember: Mana cannot run out. Vael takes good care of you. He even apologizes to the last person he kills. "Your death is just another failure of mine," he says.

Yes. That is Vael dead below us. We did it! We killed Vael! Said to be the 2nd toughest Boss in Blackwing Lair. Yowza.

Here's what I did different on that last fight. I kind of ignored my party a bit. About half way through the fight I stopped concentrating as much on the party as on the current Main Tank. Lesser Healing Wave is a fast, and substantial, heal. Tank after tank was to go down, but that is planned on. I was healing them all. And then we have our last Tank standing. This is a new guildmate. He is wearing a full set of Tier 0.5 gear. The Heroism set I think it's called. And I'm healing him. And healing him, and I'm watching Vael's percent still dropping. 6. 5. 4. And I'm thinking "Don't say anything, don't jinx this." 3. 2. And I'm thinking "WHAT the hell?!!" And then Vael is moving around more and the new Warrior is out there and I move in and I keep this guy in sight like he's the only thing that matters. And he is the only thing that matters. 1. So close! So close! And then ZERO!!!1!one!!! We'd done it! Our first Vael kill. I knelt down next to his massive head and prayed that his spirit return to a better place.

And, now, for something completely different:

My wife and I created two Tauren Hunters. We do this sometimes, create new hunters, and then go find unique pets. For two level 11 Tauren Hunters what would be something pretty difficult to get? That's right. Owls from Teldrassil. But where there's a will, there's a way.

Here we are, outside of Dolanar, ready to go tame some Owls. I know we must have freaked a few elves out. When we finally found our prey, two level 9 Strigid Hunters, we had a small audience. As we finished taming both of them they applauded, mounted, and rode off. And we hearthstoned back to Bloodhoof Village in Mulgore.

"Need More Cowbell" is the guild we made. Too good a guild name not to have it.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Grats on being there for Rag. Thus far in the game I'm all Alliance, so I find it fun to read about Horde experiences in the same dungeons. I think my first Horde toon will be the Blood Elf. My fantasy is vain and requires pretty. :-)

Kinless said...

Last night we returned to Molten Core and we did a complete run in under 4 hours. That was like an impossible dream when we first started, when it took us 4 hours to get to only Lucifron and Magmadar. How far we've come.

It didn't require much more than two or so nights a week. Merely the dedication to attend the raids with regularity. And the better we became the faster the runs. It seems endless in the early days. Now we now we can actually even consider going to ZG after MC to blow off some steam. Raiding doesn't have to replace a life. :)