Musings of a Holy Hybrid

New Home - Married IRL

2008-04-07T01:43:00.004-04:00

So yea, in case you hadn't seen over at BRK's or on Blog Azeroth, the slight changes I mentioned?

I'm moving to a different type of blog. Teej had this crazy idea where, you know, I could still write about WoW and stuff, but I would also not feel too guilty writing about my other toons if I made it a blog that was... a bunch of stuff.

Cause I have a lot of stuff I could write about.

And so could my husband. We've both got this awesome job of Co GMing, and then there's this other stuff we do... no not that, but gaming in general, like all the other gaming stuff we do.

I know, technical terms all around, but I feel like I'm breaking up with someone here! "It's not you, its me..."

So, if you're still wanting PRIEST ONLY content, it's cool, I can understand. There's good people out there who write all about priesting. But I'm moving over to MarriedIRL... join me?

<3 Cay

Slight Changes

2008-03-28T15:11:00.001-04:00

So, I'm thinking of a change in scenery...

I'm working on a Wordpress home...

And I'm also considering a tiny name change.

Lemme 'splain:

It's been 2 months now since I respec'd Cay from her 23/38/0 Hybrid spec to a full 20/41/0 Holy spec.

So she's not really a holy hybrid anymore...

: /

So yea. Be prepared for a bit of a change. ^.^

But then again, as a wise monkey once said, "Change is good."

^.^

PS: The pic I nabbed is one of Ayashi's icons... it was really funny, and I had to share!

Fired

2008-02-28T13:24:00.003-05:00

So yea, despite the awesomeness that AC has achieved in the past month, February is totally Fired.

Why you may wonder?

On top of all the crapola that I divulged from my last post... Fio got laid off this Monday.

F- YOU FEBRUARY!

/grumble

Anywho, on to something cooler, which is the awesomeness that is my guild.

We got Leo down for the first time on Monday (huzzah!) and although we didn't get him last night, that's ok, we got him to 3%! So yea, just need to perfect the technique. Also, I died on my inner demon... I wish there was a simulator or something so I could practice going from healbot mode to killer mode... it's not as easy as you may think. And I HAVE a DPS priest. So it's not like it's some foreign idea to me. But I guess it's getting out of the "I'm the Healer" into the "I'm the Healed" type mindset. People dread when I call out names during the Inner Demon phaze. Because I only call out healer names, which means they're busy killing their demon and can't heal the others fighting their demons or the Lock tank at the moment.

Anywho, I can't blab much, I'm at work and this might turn into a big ol' chunky weird type post, so I will do what I wanted to do and that POST VIDEOS!

The Hydross Vid - Youtube
The Maggy Vid - Filefront (it's big, 137MB)
The Leo Vid - Youtube

Enjoy!

So, what the heck?

2008-02-23T13:13:00.003-05:00

I've fallen off the blogger bandwagon in a big way. However, lemme explain -

Since I last updated, AC has downed Magtheridon, Hydross and Void Reaver. I missed the Void Reaver kill though, and I'm still working on the Maggy Video (though Hydross is out there.)

/serious hat
I missed the VR kill because in my life outside of WoW, Jas's grandmother died, and his father has been diagnosed with lung cancer. On top of that I had a really disappointing time at my first midwife appointment and we both came down with the flu. So, it's been a depressing February in the life and times of Teh Squeak.
/tosses serious hat out the window

So yea, I've a serious case of LoGaS* to go and write, but now I do. Fio's gran was a wonderful lady, she lived till 90, and died very fast. Something about a flesh eating bacteria, which, is weird to hear of outside an episode of House, but there you have it. We're still not sure how she got it, but Tuesday she went in for emergency surgery, Friday morning she was gone. It was my first time experiencing death of a family member close at hand. I mean, growing up, I didn't really know my own grandparents, they were thousands of miles away. My family is Mom, Dad, and my brother. Fio's family is all extended and on top of each other here in RI... so yea, the wake and funeral were an experience for me. But Jas's sister should have had her baby by now, and seeing a very pregnant sister in the face of the death of a family member, had a really awesome synergy to it. Death to life and all that.

Jas's dad's cancer though totally came out of left field. The man hasn't smoked since Jason was 3. It's been almost a quarter of a century since he last put butt to lips... so they're thinking it's one of those freak things. After the first bombshell of that news though, things seem to get better and better. It's large cell, which means it's not prone to spreading (at least easily), it's treatable and he's already started Chemo/Radiation therapy. So that's all good stuff.

Oh, and this past week was an epic fail. Jas and I were both awfully sick with whatever flu bug is going around. He got hit harder than I did, probably because of stress. But now I'm feeling tons better and ready to tackle all the crap we had to kinda put to the side in AC.

We've stalled a little bit, but we're pushing through. We lost our only pally tank, but one of our holy ones took up the job, so now we're in full blown recruitment mode for another Pally healer and a resto shammy too. We're getting back on track, and gonna hopefully be seeing a dead Leo, Fathom Lord, Tidewalker and Solarian this coming March. ^.^ I want to get my first gander of Lady Vashj before Apirl Fool's day ;p

____

Otherwise, since things have been so epicly crappy, I've taken the time to veg out and whoa... I got my horde pally to 63. She's probably going to be holy by the time I hit 70, but I'd love to try out prot.

Leveling is so ridiculously easy now that 2.3 has come out. I mean... they nerfed Princess for Chris'sake! Princess! Nerfed! Wtf?!

But I'll have to make that a separate post. I've got some things I wanted to link to that I don't have access to right now... so yea, something to look forward to ;)

Till I see you agains. Oh and I'll post the Hydross video very soon... it was slightly chaotic and goofy, but fun ^.^
*Lack of Give a Shit

I'm alive

2008-02-19T16:37:00.002-05:00

I live, I swear.

I haven't forgotten, just a lot of life has come up. More to come later tonight.

Haha! Take That!

2008-01-15T09:09:00.000-05:00

Rarg! AC finally got Doomwalker... and I MISSED IT! T.T

Basically, after pwning Gruul's, we all booked it over to Doomwalker in the Black Temple area. Bastard knew his time was up!

Our first attempt... I forgot to FRAPS, but we all wiped at 5% anywho...

Our second attempt we go him... but in MID HEAL... my game locked. Fio was already kissing gravel because our pally tank (Destroy of teh Uber AoE Taunt!) didn't really tick Doomwalker off to bad with his "HEY OVER HERE NEWB!" Splat goes Boomkin.

But yea. I relog into WoW, hearing all the action as it unfolds on vent... And as SOON as I log in... the ground disappears. My PC has won the Biggest Douche of the Year Award. And it's only January! /huff

So I restart the PC but not before I watch over Fio's shoulder AC take him down. Lots of people died, it wasn't a clean kill, but we did it.

Also, we happened to have a tiny bit of luck in that the second Alliance guild on Drenden finally killed Kael'thas, thus completing their Black Temple requirements, and they also happened to be doing their BT attunement when Doomwalker was at like... 20%? >.> Much love to the Insurrection people who went, Haha! and Pew Pew'd for justice (I think it was like 2 people XD and they died cause no one could see them to heal them.)

FYI, Drenden is really, really behind in raid progression. The first guild to clear Black Temple did so a day after Christmas? I think? I have to check forum boards again. But now another Alliance guild will start making with the tier 6 goodies, and the Hordies over in Heresiarch killed Kael yesterday, now they just need to nail Vashj and then we'll have some Hordies in Tier 6 epix. So fun times are a comin' ^.^

OH! And another thing! Brig got his resist gear back! So we're back on track in SSC again. We tried Tidewalker a few times... but he has this nasty tendency to make Celli get all squished. But from what I'm to understand... Tidewalker and up is SRS BIZNIZ in the raiding to come... so time to shoulder the yoke and press on.

So yea, there's a WoW update for you... something priestly coming soon.... I think. XD

1 F&^$K*#&$G PERCENT!

2008-01-08T17:19:00.000-05:00

So, while waiting for patch 2.3.2 to install, I'm going to blog for a moment.

Last Wednesday, AC went in and Pwn'd Lurker, again. First raid of '08. Huzzah! Sunday was our schedule TK raid, our second foray into The Eye.... well, ok, no, it didn't go, the Raid Leader of Awesomesauce's ISP was epicly douchy and crapped out on him for a whole day. I had a small heart attack, since I KNEW he wouldn't miss raid and we couldn't get in touch with him... but that's just me. I'm prone to worry. Character flaw.

Anywho! So, we had a group go into Zul'Aman instead, and ate the Bear (though didn't make the 20 mins) and got Eagle Wings to go on our second shot.

Then there was yesterday. Monday is Gruul day. We started 15 mins late, but one shot the place and finished in record time. It was 9pm. Time for a World Boss? Sure! Doomwalker is up, let's go look at him!

15 mins to get there, explain the fight and in we go! Not quite sure who to heal when... but mid way through the fight, we got the rhythm down... 20% he enrages (crap I'm laggin', gotta shut off the vid, or else I'm going to lag out)... 15% and most of the DPS is dead... fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck HOLY CRAP ONLY HEALERS ALIVE! QUICK! DPS DPS DPS!

Everyone dead... he's at 1%.

/epic fail

It was our first shot of the night, our second shot was fraught with Line of Sight issues. And our third, we had started tossing in too many new people... We had to call it then, since it was 11 and people had to go.

But that first try is haunting us now.

1%. He was down to like 18K HP er something.

He's already dead. He just doesn't know it yet. /seethe

OMG I swar it's the last for today

2007-12-29T15:41:00.000-05:00

Critical QQ. He makes me giggle. ^.^

...and a Happy New Year

2007-12-29T13:05:00.000-05:00

Damn it Destroy. He's got that damn Portal song stuck in my head.

So, hope everyone who had one had a very Awesometastic Christmas. I know Fio and I had a totally tubular one ^.^

Not only did we drive like crazies to Ohio and back, and we broke down and bought a 360 for some Mass Effect/Assassin's Creed, but, we got to see the Demonic Ponytail pre-taming. ^.^

All in all a very fun weekend. And what's even better? I got to post up the raid schedule for the next week. Hurray back to SSC! And our Raid Leader of Awesome also figured we'd head back over to TK and take another stab at VR. Which I am teh excited about ^.^

I'm just glad to be raiding again. Don't get me wrong, the break was nice, it let's me fart around in the game (and there fore keep my interest) but the constant raiding we were doing was wearing on me. That and it was refreshing to be away for a few days. Though, as you probably heard, total asshatery did commence and some jerk face hacked into one of my friends accounts. Freakin' turd. I swear... well, I did swear, a lot that night. Felt bad about calling Immy at 11:30 at night to say "ZOMG YOU'RE BEING HACKED DUDE CALL BLIZZ!" but at least we got it handled. Though I would have no problems putting that dickface's balls (or tits) into a meat grinder for pulling shit like this 2 days before Christmas. I hope Santa brought him a chainsaw anemia. /growl

Anywho, back to something a tad more pleasant, my guild of Awesome has put the feelers out there for some like minded friends to come raid with us. We did the O board forums post and TJ, Kitty, and Doom were all nice enough to post threads in their blog. I like the page Kitty did the most with Fio's little addendum on the bottom, so I'm going to link to it here. So far we've had some awesome people come and apply and we even got a healy priesty to come play. He's pretty kick butt, nice guy and has a funny sense of humor. Bonus ^.^ Now we just need a shadow priest to come and app *puppy dog eyes* so Kitty won't steal my DCoE away. He's a greedy wench sometimes.
;P

The meeting with new raiders and getting back together with the gang is something I'm really lookin' forward to. Excitement + Fun = the raiding I wanna do ^.^

OK, this whole post seems to meander all over the place. The next thing I wanted to mention was my Shadow Priest pet, Rakzha. I decided to stay in Azeroth long enough to get mining to 295 and then I booked it back to Outlands. I have... SO much fun with Outlands quests. They are just too awesome. And I did a bit of a marathon of Ramps/Blood Furnace for her and now she has pretty much everything a caster would want out of there sans the belt from BF. Oh, and the pants? You know, the EVIL PANTS. Totally didn't get them. I don't care that they're uber awesome in stats, blah blah blah. Nope. Not going to happen. I got the plate and sold them. /dusts off hands

I need to look at her spec again though. I think I went a little crazy with the shadow tree. But I'm putting it off for now. I'll definitely revisit it once she hits 70 though that's for sure. And now, I'm off. After finishing the Opera post and this, I think this is me trying to catch up XD
There should be a Gruul's post coming shortly, that's for sure. (Yea, shortly, like the Opera one, that took 2 months T.T)

Healing Opera: Figaro!

2007-12-29T12:46:00.000-05:00

I had a really funny pic to go along with this post. But Bloggers picture thingies was down and then I lost the link.

Sad panda.

Anywho!

I know it's a long time coming(in fact, this has been in drafts for a loooong time now. Since October 17th to be exact...) Here be my experiences with the awesome Opera event in Karazhan.

Now, what's nifty about this event is that it has three different types of bosses. All three are big fairy tale rip offs, but that makes them even more amusing.
The three events you can get are The Big Bad Wolf (BBW), Romulo and Julianne (R&J) or Oz. All three have their quirks and this is by far, one of my most favorite fights in the instance.

So, I'll start with the "easiest" fight.

Big Bad Wolf

Firstly, about a minute before the fight starts, Fear Ward the tank. This way you have anout a minute into your cooldown into the fight and you might get another ward off during the fight.

Usually our MT tanks Wolfie in a corner, and all your ranged DPS is going to be grouped in another corner. You're going to want to start, as always, with your handy dandy Frisbee, and sometimes, BBW will start the fight with a Little Red and a Fear, so be on your toes. The Little Red Riding Hood Debuff he does is SO. MUCH. FUN. Srsly. I luff's it. You turn into this cute little gnome in red clothing, your armor is reduced to zero, but your running speed gets a boost. When the debuff happens and its not you, prepare to shield/frisbee/heal the bejesus outta the Little Red.

Depending on how many hit points the victim is and how well their "OMG I'M THE GNOME!" running technique is, they may need it. Also, while there's not much of an aggro table while he's running after Red, keep in mind that he resumes normal aggro after the debuff wears off. The debuff lasts about and a half runs around the stage or until Red gets clobbered. So still, watch your aggro. And re Frisbee the tank as soon as you can.

Otherwise, it's just your standard fair of Frisbee/Renew/GHeal on the tank. Due to the new fear rules, if you miss out on a Fear during the fight, don't worry too much, just make sure your Renew is still going since, well, you can't heal when you're running around like a chicken with your head cut off for 3 seconds.

Oh and btw, when YOU get to be little Red, don't panic. Just Shield while running, slap a Renew on yourself juuuuuust in case, and make sure you hug the wall. Don't take any short cuts while you're running along the wall, because Wolfie will catch up to you (he cheats.)
And once the bugger is dead, he'll have a nice cloak waiting for you (RIGHT?!)
Red Riding Hood's Cloak

Romulo and Julianne

This fight is pretty gimmicky, but it's also fairly simple to heal. We've always done this fight with two tanks, though I've heard one tank can do it too. There are two bosses and the idea is this:

The fight starts with Julianne and she has some fairly standard abilities: she heals, she has a holy DoT she'll randomly toss on people and she's got a buff on her that makes her cast faster.

Usually you put whatever spell interrupters you can on her, because that heal is annoying and possibly fight breaking (you'll see why in a sec.) During this part, if you're assigned to heal this tank, it's pretty smooth sailing with your Renew/Frisbee combo, though be prepared to toss a Renew out to your raid members since that DoT does a good chunk of initial damage and DoT.

Once she's kissing floor board, Romulo spawns. (Keep in mind, these guys are UNTAUNTABLE, so try to time your Renew if possible. Romulo one shots clothies T.T)
So ok, once you've stopped giggling at how flaming Rom sounds, just keep in mind he's all melee. He has a buff that makes him attack faster, he'll fling any DPS that's directly behind him waaay across the room and he has a Poison that stacks on the tank that decreases their stats by a %.
That poison is nasty, and hopefully you have a Druid/Shammy/Pally to get rid of it. Not much we priesty types can do about poison. This tank will be getting hit a bit harder because Rom's all... muscle... (we guess XD) but he also dies fairly quickly and simply.

Now the fun part. Once Rom's down, Julianne rises from the dead (again) and rez's Rom.
Now you have both up and here's the kicker: they both have to die within ten seconds from each other, or else the living one rez's the other. Here's where Juli's heal becomes extremely annoying. But otherwise, it's a repeat of healing techniques, just watch out for the raid since Juli's going to be DoTing away at her hearts content at them. If you have the interrupts, you could see if they could use one or two on those DoTs, but priority goes to killing her heal. Also, the Buffs (Devotion on Juli, Daring on Rom) can be spell stolen and Dispel'd. So if it's needed, you can dispel those buffs so that they aren't going all super speedy.

It's a bonus, swarz.
And once they're both in eternal slumber, you can hope to nab the Masquerade Gown from Julianne (Rom's got nothing for healy types.)

Oz

By far, the most awesome and fun of the three events in Opera. Few things of note:
Dorothee's aggro table is random - she just shoots frost bolts at whoever and she's usually the first to die.
Tito spawns mid fight and is a tank and spank. Just make sure Dorothee's dead before you kill him or else she enrages and things get ugly.
Strawman does an AoE fear/stun but he can be pretty much solo'd by a lock/firemage/flaming shammy. Fire spells keep him confused and do uber damage to him. And no, Holy Fire doesn't count T.T (I tried).
Roar hits pretty hard, but he can be kept feared by either a lock, your Psychic scream, or a hunter's Fear Beast and it lasts a bit longer than normal, because he's weak to fear. He's usually the third to go down after Dorothee and Tito.
Tinhead hits like a truck and is usually given to the MT to kite around the room. You see, after like 15 seconds, he starts getting this debuff called Rust and it slows him down. So as long as the tank has his attention, he's pretty much the last one to die in the melee (before Crone.)
The Crone doesn't spawn until all the others are dead. She does a chain lightening, doesn't hit all that hard, and separate from here there's a Cyclone whizzing around on stage. Just avoid it, otherwise it knocks you into the air (you can still cast instant spells, like Levitate ^.^) and then you fall to the ground and take a bunch of falling damage if you happen to be out of Light Feathers >.>

Try and have an OT tank Tito, Roar and Strawman, and watch the raid's health with Dorothee's crazy frost bolts. Renew is probably going to be the biggest thing you do in the fight. Though, when Tinhead comes into the fray and your MT picks him up, toss a few Frisbee's the MT's way to solidify his aggro on him. Otherwise, watch your butt around Strawman (that aoe fear thing sucks) and keep everyone healed.

Don't worry too much about going low on mana if you do: if you keep Tinhead till last and you have a pally in the group /cheer. Have them toss up a Judgement of Wisdom? (the one to get mana back) and just level your weapon skill. Tinhead has a lot of HP, and make sure ranged and melee don't attack him during this. It's a great way to refresh the raids mana pool for the Crone.
Once she spawns, MT picks up, watch out for the Cyclone, and stay behind and away from her. That Chain Lightening isn't a pleasant feeling. Frisbee/Renew/GHeal and then... LEWT!
The biggest thing for the healy priesty here is the Blue Diamond Witchwand. Rejoice in your lewtness! ^.^

Ok, there was one item that can potentially drop from all three fights that I skipped and thats the Ribbon of Sacrifice. I have it. I've used it before in Kara... but I find it lacking. The use trinkets really aren't all that optimal for priest types because a lot of our heal strategy is based on burst/planned healing. Renew and the Frisbee are really good maintainers, but we don't spam GHeal or FHeal unless we want to go OOM very quickly. It's a good OH SH!T button, but from what I've heard it's a better for 25 mans... I'll try and get back to you guys on that, but for now, I've just stuck with my Scarab of the Infinite Cycle and (Pre Gruul) Bangle of Endless Blessings.

I love snow

2007-12-20T18:23:00.000-05:00

So, as the title implies, fat falling flakes of precipitation is the only reason why I love living in the Northeast.

The crappy response by RI state officials non withstanding, I still love the snow. There's just something about it that makes me feel like I'm 10 years old again, outside sledding or rolling aorund in it, tosses snowballs at my brother/father and or making a snowy mess.

Like so:

Enjoy my masterpiece. He is Carlos, Man of ... horns?

Ok, so maybe not, but I had to toss something on him.

What does this have to do with WoW? Not a terrible amount really. But, suffice to say, WoW still goes, my guild of awesome is taking a raiding break for the holidays, we're pugging Karazhan on alts and anxiously awaiting the new year when we can really start working on progress in SSC. That place looks like tons of fun. Like seriously, oodles of it.

I'm going to be gone for the rest of the week visiting the parents in Ohio (yea, we're driving there, pray that the Snow waits until I'm off the road XD) and then driving back home to see Fio's parents on Christmas day. Granted, his parents live in the same state as us... but yea. I'm teh uber excited to see my family after not seeing my brother for ages and my parents since summer.

Priestings! Rakzha is now in Outland. Thank you Blizz for that 2.3 patch! I leveled Rak from 45 to 53 over the weekend and have been hashing out more and more levels since. Being on Raiding break also helps with the leveling of alts, but I always seem to find time. Since I barely remember when I leveled Cay, I'm hoping that my 242 shadow damage at lvl 58 with pwn many Azeroth quests. I took Rak at level 40 something to do all the new quests in Dustwallow Marsh, and seriously, Blizz is pushing hardcore for people to level, cause I breezed through on this toon. Also, I did decide to just go with the Shadoweave gear into the Felcloth gear and let me tell you, so much fun. I'm having minimal drink time (Yay spirit Tap!) and much shadow pwnage. (Sorry gang, if you're looking for math, I'm not a great person at it. To me, its all about feel).

I'm very excited to start getting Rak into some parties and totally noobing up my role as a mana battery. Soon, I'll be trolling places like Kirk's and Apathy's to see how best to make the most of my shadow'ing dmg and mana efficiency outputs. Though since Fio is better at math than me, he's helping me along too. Doesn't know too much about priests, but knows enough about offensive casters to help me along.

So, as of right now, with another Outland quest for her wand and maybe one or two more for XP, Rak will go back to places like Burning Steppes (which, she hasn't touched yet btw), EPL, Winterspring and Silithus. All these places are virgin questing territory to her, and I like to finish up as much as I can in Azeroth so that it 1) puts me at about 60 going into Hellfire and B) gives me more Outland quests I can finish for money at 70.

Btw, when she gets her tailoring up there, I've already got all the mats for her Frozen Shadoweave Set and the Battlecast Set.

I know, I'm a noob.

I have too many alts... T.T

(Warlocks are fun!)

Ok, time to pack for the trip, but first, finding all the links I'll need for this post, so people don't have to guess wtf I'm talking about...

Now I'm rambling... ZOMG LATER! <3

SSC Awesomeness

2007-12-06T19:55:00.000-05:00

Yup, as you've prolly heard, over and over again, Aetherial Circle 1 : Serpentshrine Cavern 0!

Well, at least for now ;)

Here's the kill vid, on Younoob for now, but I'm looking into throwing it up on Filefront or Warcraftmovies.com er something.

Color me excited ^.^

Srsly, it was such a fun fight. We would have had him last week if it wasn't for the damn fish.

Tonight, I take a break from raiding. I've been at it non stop since Saturday, and I needs me a break! Tomorrow too, but I'll be back at it with Cay on Saturday to (hopefully) get my tier4 hat, since OH! Yea, one of the drops in SSC last night?
Belt of the Long Road pattern = mine
/dance

Now I can like, bid on those Nether Vortex's. Wewtness ^.^

Ok, this good cheer of mine is much needed, 'specially since our previous two days had been total train wrecks. Murphy ran crazy stupid on our Gruul's run Monday. It was so bad, we didn't get him that night (though Maulgar bit it hard, he's always bent over since we first laid eyes on him, the slut ;P)
Tuesday night in Zul'Aman wasn't much better. We killed the Bear boss in under 20 minutes for the second time, attempted to go for the Eagle in the time frame but wiped mid way through the gauntlet. So we skipped Eagle and went straight for our Nemisis, that damn Dragonhawk.

We know the fight. We've gotten it down... we can do it. The game just won't let us.

But it's cool, we know and realize that it's a pretty decent gear check. Time to get more into SSC ^.^

I know this is kinda a hackney update, but it's here! And I'm really hungry, so I'm going to go gets some foodages. Makin' vid's is hungry work!

Oh! 'nother thing. I have the vid's from our Bear, Eagle and Lynx kills, but I'm going to do a bit of a colaberation vid on ZA, and I need the Dragonhawk kill before I post it. Plus, I'm experimenting/learning how to use Sony Vegas 8. Is Vegas 7 easier to figure out if you're not all rad with the media lingo? I dunno, but yea, I will be experimenting with that soon. ^.^

For now, FOOOOOD!

Color me excited!

2007-11-29T13:16:00.001-05:00

So, no Maggy last night BUT! We (as in AC) had our first foray into Serpent Shrine Cavern, and let me tell you, I'm teh UBAH excited!

Our goal was to start the learning pains of the Luker Below fight.

This is a fun fight. ZOMG.

From what I heard from some of our old fart 40 man raiders, it's reminiscent of the Ragnaros fight, but I wouldn't have a clue about that. During the first part of the fight, you get to just beat up the Big Fish while the Melee fighters get all whirled around and all the range laugh maniacally with Kings on because they can't technically aggro the Lurker.

That is until they get a geyser up in their face. But then! You have to jump below the water line and take a few seconds of Scalding hot water damage as the Fish spews forth a jet of water that does retarded amounts of damage if you get caught.

That's just the first part. The second part is when he submerges, and then adds come out and try to stop us from killing the Fish. They are easily squishable, but watch out for the Guardians, for they will one shot anything not Plate. After a minute, the Fish comes back, Spouts the raid, and then we resume the killing.

No, we didn't get to kill him our first time in, simply because we had to take most of the time getting the timing right on killing adds and jumping under water... our best shot was our last attempt, but unfortunately, once trash respawns, the water goes from Scalding hot to FISH OF DEATH. We wiped due to mass Parana overload. Still though, we spanked the trash in there, and I'm VERY excited to start doing SSC in our raid roster.

Now, you might be wondering, "Wait, didn't she just say they were starting Void Reaver/Maggy?" Yes, we did take a few jaunts into those place, but so far, SSC has been the most fun, and it's very, very doable for us at this point. So, Sundays, ZA shumshing, bring on the SSC!

And I'd have more to say, but I'm at work XD

Ah well, there's always next year.

2007-11-27T18:29:00.001-05:00

As the title says, me thinks NaNo and NaBlo have slipped my grasp this year. Blarg.

BUT THAT'S OK.

I'm finding that my posting was going to crap, so time to do a little revamp. I'm way behind in updating some of my links, so many new bloggers I want to link to (<3Ratshag) as well as some people who've moved (*grumble* twice now... *grumble*)

I've got a hankerin' to do post about Gruuls. We've gotten the Lair down pat now, to the point where we're killing him sooner and soon. Much fun. And don't make me use the dreaded... word. I dislike it, because it makes me feel like it's become a chore, er something.

Zul'Aman has been a really fun experience. I went in there with a big head thinking, hell, we could probably get to Zul'jin the first night... and then had a pleasent azzkicking from one side of the bear boss to another. He whooped us good. But that's fine. So far, we've gotten Bear, Eagle and Lynx down and still having issues with the Dragonhawk, but we got really close this past Sunday.

With the holiday this past week (and I hope everyone had a great Turkey day, I know I did ^.^) we didn't get any 25 mans done, but we filled it with Kara pugs and ZA learning pains. All is good.

Well, except for one thing. Maybe a few, but here's the thing I'm going to talk about.

My survivability right now blows.

Totally, completely blows.

Hard.

I'm dying a lot in ZA. My HP are low. Unbuffed, I was at 6.7K. Other clothies were kicking my butt, even the Shadow PeW PeW priesty. WTF. So, after some gear comparisons, I've decided that while my PMC set has served me well, it's time to start bidding on Tier gear. I've been avoiding it for so long because others could use it more than I could. But I'm starting to see that while the PMC/Whitemend set is fan-fucking-tastic for Kara, it's lack of base stats (and TOTAL lack of stamina on the PMC) is killing me, literally.

Going to hop over to Kirk's to see what he has to say about it (unless he responds here, in which case <3) but other wise, last night I got my tier 4 shoulders. I got a belt with some stamina (Cord of Sanctification)...

Wait.

Time to get in your laugh at teh Squeaker. So I log in to DE some things for a guildie. Not a problem for me really, I'm always willing to help and I had done it before for them. Well, you see, they sent me a bunch of Runecloth belts and some Netherweave boots to DE. Not a problem, right? It's funny (not) but did you know that the icon for the Runecloth belt and the Cord of Sanctification ARE THE SAME DAMN THING?!

Yea. I looked up, saw I had a VOID CRYSTAL... and panic ensued.
I just DE'd my purple belt from HEROIC DURNHOLD. SHOOT ME NOW. >.<

But I was lucky to get an awesome GameMaster to help me out. He restored it. Destroyed the Void on the spot to show him that I really, truly, just wanted my belt back. Disaster averted. Lesson learned. I will pay closer attention to what I'm DEing...

Anywho, tangent aside, I was able to raise my HP a few 100. Still not pleased, but I guess I'll live. The biggest upgrade in stamina would be my Chest, but that means killing Maggy. He's scheduled for tomorrow night. I'm excited and a bit worried. One of our most awesome of guildies had her subscription run out, and she's spot out of luck on getting it back for a least a month or two, and she was one of our warlocks. So we're low ballin' Maggy again. We will have Teh Awesome that is TJ, so hilarity will ensure, I'm sure.

By the way, I don't think I mentioned it, but DPSing in Gruul's was SO MUCH FUN.

PLEASE DON'T NERF MEH! I'm having fun pwning face with holy justice! :P

Oh, and another thing. Thanks Ego for answering my question on Roleplaying. I feels all special that I got a post from the Ego. /cheer

Ok, time to refresh blog face...

That thing...

2007-11-18T16:03:00.000-05:00

TJ's favorite song is stuck in my head.

And I have no access to music to unstick it.

/brainsplody

In other news, Sasha MT'd up to Aran in Kara last night. We could have gotten him, but the group make up was rough for that fight: 2 mages, 1 lock, 0 rogues/warriors, so we had no interrupts save for Counter Spell.

This is not very priesty, more druidy... but I have a curse, I really do. If there's something out there that I can get crafted/enchanted, but I could possibly get an upgrade from a Kara run, if I get the crafted/enchanted item that day, I get the upgrade in Kara.

Case in point. When Cay first started Kara, I was holding out on getting my Hallowed Handwraps enchanted with 35+ healing because they weren't purple, and well, that enchant's expensive! But it was our first run, and I wanted to max out and and all +healing I could, so I did.

What do you know? The freakin' Gloves of Saintly Blessing dropped. Oy.

Last night I had Fio's hunter make me the Necklace of the deep for my ferlol tanky, and after gemming it up with 2 shifting Nightseyes... the freaking Barbed Choker of Discipline dropped. /headdesk

Don't get me wrong... I'm ecstatic to finally get a Kara tanky piece for my druid... but I'm cursed XD

Oh and yea, been to Kara with Sasha 3 times, each time she's gotten a healy drop... except for last night. /huzzah

I passed on the DPS leather since we had some main toons rolling with us and helping them get DPS gear for the 25 mans = happy healerzors.

Ok, taken up enough time... and I'll be editing this later to like... put in links 'n stuff.

Yes... I like the dots...

More dots...
More dots...

Alright, sotp dots XD

Do it, please

2007-11-16T19:27:00.000-05:00

What the hell was I thinking?

This new job sucks.

Not because I have this adverse thing to work or anything, I don't really.

But there's no organization. There's no cooperation. The manager is a total territorial bitch. The job itself, while easy, is boring, but I can deal with that. The people suck. And the company training programs? HOW DO THESE PLACES STAY IN BUSINESS?! SERIOUSLY! /huff

It's so bad I can't even think WoW thoughts at work, because I'm in fear for my life anytime I step into the back rooms. Surprise ninjas or a mouse might knock over the 300 lbs of clothing onto my head, crushing me without so much a peep.

I'm not sure I'm going to survive. I'm looking again. I'm going to chalk up my decision to seriously fill out an application at a department store during holiday season as a temporary act of insanity.

And I got distracted mid post... I'm a freakin' genius.

Playing Moon for now...

That's it for today... I think... yup... distracted again.

OK, you're right it's later..

2007-11-15T17:37:00.000-05:00

What have I been doing?

Other than rockin' out with my Giddglet and her new Rolfcopter?

700 spell damage.

In my healing gear.

They're going to freakin' nerf it. I know it.

But I'm enjoying every bloomin' minute while I can!

I can actually damage things in less than a minute! I dueled our Raid leader of awesome before we tried out ZA, AND WON! (Ok, yea, he's prot, but he's in plate, usually just giggled while I tickle him for three to six hundred dmg a spell).

They're going to nerf it, wait and see.

I haven't been able to play too much with the new fear ward mechanics, so that will have to wait. As for the Chastise spell... well, the stun on it is laughable. It never lasts. It's a 2 second stun, and you have to stand still to cast it. Pally's get Hammer of Justice, instant cast can be done on the run. Chastise so far hasn't stunned my opponent long enough for me to move out of melee. And the dmg it does it meh. I dunno, I might go into a battleground or arena to really test it out. I've got a bunch of badges, I can gets me some PvP gear that way.

Zul'Aman: Brutal. Freakin' Brutal. But I'm so glad to be doing something new with the gang. The trash leading up to Nalorakk was easy, the adds he throws at you can get a bit hairy, especially that last group with the guys mounted on bears. They do this scream that increases the dmg people take by 25%. The tanks had to separate a bit or else they'd get both screams (yea, it stacks) and then get munched.

Nalorakk hits like Nightbane. We'll need at least 3 healers for him, we went in with two. I'm looking forward to pwning his face on Sunday.

Maggy!

On Monday, AC did something so incredibly awesome, I was speechless (ok, for all of five seconds). We one shot Gruul's Lair. High King Maulgar (3 mins 59 seconds). Gruul (6 mins someodd seconds.) Dead, dead. So we mosie'd on over to Maggys. We were going to be going there any way on Wednesday, but we figured, hell, it's 930. Let's try it! So we did. The trash pulls took some getting used too. And we only had 3 warlocks with us. On our first try, we going 3 of the adds down, then had to call it a night. But not bad for our very first try ^.^

Wednesday rolls around, we got our tanks, got our heals... but again, short on locks. We've got 4 raiding locks and 1 couldn't make it, so we were going in at a pretty harsh handicap (at least according to all the strats out there.) But we were going to try it anyway (we be stubborn SoBs.)

83% was our best short. We spent a lot of time trying to figure out cube clickers. People would die early too, things like that. One thing it did make me think was whether or not I should try Circle of Healing. I'm the only raiding priest at the moment with Divine Spirit buff, and that's more of a benefit to the raid. We had two shammy's with us healing them. Need moar locks. T.T

But, we're planning on going back this Monday, after Gruuls (barring we have the time). Sunday is another shot at Zul'Aman, and I'm looking forward to that ^.^

That's it for now, more later, since I'm hoping (though it's probably not likely) to get some baby priesty love tonight. I want to check out the new quest hub in Dustwallow and she needs her elephant!

I may have fallen... wait, shiny....

2007-11-13T18:06:00.001-05:00

Shiny patch 2.3 today. More later.

Time to face it

2007-11-11T13:23:00.000-05:00

I didn't make it T.T

Cop out? I think not!

2007-11-10T19:11:00.000-05:00

Yea, I have tons of word count to catch up on. But instead of being able to type up the thoughts I had today, we're going to try something semi different.

Caption!

I want whoever's bored to come up with a caption to this picture.

Weiner gets to choose the next thing I write about. I'll give everyone until Nov 15th. I'll post my reply to their topic on the 18th.

Sound fun? Good. ^.^ Your captions can just be replies here. Post your "WRITE ABOUT THIS NOWS!" with it iffn' you want.

(SHHH! This is NOT because I can't think of anything to write.... really.... ok, I'm lying... /wrists)

Here's your pic!

Hi, my name is LATE

2007-11-09T23:27:00.000-05:00

And I live in.... insanity.

This post started at 11:30pm. I'm probably not going to make much sense or substance. Why? I PuG'd Kara on my tank. Then had to go in an emergency heal on Cay.

Oh, and the past 24 hours have been spent getting said tank her Flamewrought Key. So now she can do Heroic Auch, Coilfang and Hellfire Pen.

As bad as it sounds... it wasn't half bad. Did three runs of Shattered Hals last night and three today to get my 9.2K rep needed. Got Sasha her wastewalker gloves.

So there's a mini update. Can't type much more... brain turning to mush.

/falls unconscious

What is the Squeakie Listening too?

2007-11-08T17:51:00.000-05:00

After looking at TJ's post about music... I must confess. My Pandora looks nothing like hers.

In fact, doesn't look much like Doom's either (he hasn't posted yet /huff)

Nor does it look much like Fio's. Though, we do have some similar tastes.

During Raid, I usually don't have any music playing, especially if it's brand new content. That's usually because I'm too busy concentrating on raid, and everything that's going on.

But after raid, what does teh Squeakie need to calm her jets or just relax with?

A few things:

Tool
Dead Can Dance
Bjork

Those figure high up on my list of stuff to listen to when I feel like just... chillin'. Though I do admit, I'm not too happy with some of the new Tool, and Perfect Circle, while nifty, does fit nicely, since it's a much calmer Tool.

Oh, wondering about that Gladiator pic? Lisa Gerard, one of the lead singers in Dead Can Dance, did a lot of the vocals for that movie's soundtrack. I didn't know about DCD until I met Fio, but OMG. Just.... awesome music.

Now, the Pandora thing. I used to use Launchcast for all my music wants, but the commercials were annoying (when I worked for Hell, I paid, so I had something to listen to as I lost brain cells) and it has been a bit of a chore to keep updated. My music tastes change a lot, or at least what I feel like listening to. That and I would run out of skips... which is just... foul. It's still a nice place to go and listen to all the funny stuff (my comedian channel is still rockin') and it was nice to see them get tons more music (obscure things like Type O Negative and Voltaire) but Pandora is rocking my socks.

I guess it has some sort of thing with this Music Genome Project of theirs, but you basically add a band, and they'll play it, and then they'll start playing things similar to it. Not just in like "category" but by sound, instruments, vocals, length of song, pace, etc. It's really nifty. I'm still experimenting with it.

What do I listen too during instances, heroic or otherwise? Iffn' in a hyper mood...

Mindless Self Indulgence (thanks to Eska ;P)
J-Pop (varity of stuff)
They Might Be Giants
Jethro Tull
No Doubt
311
Voltaire (You HAVE to hear his Star Trek Spoofs... to die for)

... crude... just really, way to much stuff to list, but that's the jist.

My music choice is definitely out there... but there are few if any "new" bands I like. It takes a bit of time for me to hop onto the wagon (though admittedly, I like Panic at the Disco/The Killers and just LOVE Evanescence when I feel like being all emo).

(Tangent warning: This is just... really nifty. Bravo XD)

Right, where was I? Oh, music. But yea. Most of the time I'm WoWing... not much for music. Unless I'm doing to the level grind. Then I kinda need it to keep myself sane.

Oh and I do leave the ingame music on, cause, well, I like it. Though it's turned down so I can hear MY music when I want to XD

So there joo have it.

Oh hello world

2007-11-07T21:17:00.000-05:00

OMG. Sleepy.

I got home from work, intending to type up today's post, fiddled on WoW for a bit, had some more mashed potatoe/pot pie (OMG HEAVEN) and then I remember... nothing.

I don't even remember Fio coming home. This is me when I'm really sleepy. A nuke could detonate in Boston and I'd not wake up until Fio tossed me out of bed er something.

Anwho, since I passed out, I don't remember what exactly I was going to post. T.T But it's ok, I can fudge it.

Besides, TJ has made some fun suggestions for the Jackels (NaBloPoMo ftw)...

Distracted... shiny... gah. Train of thought. Lost.

I will say it's good to see Teh Diet Coke of Evil again. She's back and putting Kitty in his place! /dance

Hehe. Ummm... shoooooooot, I wanted to type something relevent to game, but this is ending up being a bunch of garble!

No Kara for the Cay-ster tonight. The lowbie raiders are in with Fio, hopefully getting some phat loots so they can join us in Gruuls and beyond.

ZA is confirmed for the 13th? Oh joygasm. I's looking forward to something new. Not a whole lot it looks like for loot in there for us clothie healy types, and I'll write about that soon too. (I know, I'm a little late into looking at the gear offered there, but gear is second, more like third to why I raid).

Mew. Going to stop now. Wake me up when its over, K?

What's this?

2007-11-06T18:07:00.000-05:00

No patch today? T.T

Ah well, I will survive. In the mean time, since I have no inspiring prompt for today, you'll get a bit of random.

Leveling cooking sucks. Leveling fishing sucks even more. Rakzha's cooking was stuck at 106 for the loooooongest time, because I had moved on from things that had dropped stuff like Murloc fins, Crispy Spider Legs and other such randomness. And it was impossible to find these things on the AH. Just absurd. I had been doing just fine getting her first aid leveled, but that's mostly because I was in such a rush to 300 tailoring, so anything left over went to the first aide fund. But still. Four stacks of turtle meat (which, btw, they've SO upped the spawn rate on that!) and I couldn't cook any of it, cause my cooking was too low.

/sigh

But I got it today. Took my Giddglet out to Wetlands, had me a Murloc Genocide, then the server restarted, and whadya know, I log back in and all the murlocs are back! 4 stacks of fins later, I got to 125, could cook the 80 pieces of tangy clam meat sitting in my bank, and I'm now going to get some Giant Eggs so she can finish up that 225 quest and level her cooking all normal again ^.^

Rarr.

Oh, and for those of you who are wondering if there's like, the smart way to level cooking, Doom posted this for people to use on our guild forums.

And now, time to salivate over the chicken pot pie on mashed potatoes that is currently cooking in my oven.

Mmmmm, potatoes.

___

Ack, I almost forgot, I kinda said something about fishing sucking even more.

It does.

It really, really does.

I don't ever want to try and level it again. But I have this sneaky suspicion someone is going to get me ~~drunk enough~~ trick me into doing it on Rakzha. Who knows.

Baby Priest

2007-11-05T13:49:00.000-05:00

So Operation Face Smelter is well under way. Rakzha is now 38, on the verge of hitting 40something and getting a special elephant of her own.

I'm going to experiment in something (and also mini rant about it too). In the next few levels, I can start wearing the Shadoweave gear (trainer for Alliance people/ trainer for Horde people). Now look. I know, this gear is more for 'Locks than it is for shadow priests. I'll be taking a hit on Intel, but I can make that up with enchants. I know that the Dreamweave stuff (you can wear the chest and gloves at 40) are more than likely better than their shadoweave counterparts. You don't need to point it out to me again and again. I get it. The Shadoweave is green, Dreamweave is blue. I GET THAT IT'S BETTER. /huff

But I don't care. Why? Because I want to test out the set. Numbers may not back these things up, but sometimes you just have to go with what feels right. Plus, I'm not PvPing, I'm leveling in a PvE environment. If I can dish out more shadowy hurt that's less time I'm spending on a mob, more time to kill more, more xp, you can see where I'm heading with this yes?

As of right now, my shadow spacegoat has been a breeze to level. Since level 10, she's had spirit tap. Let me tell you, the lessened downtime is awesome. I only carry a stack of water with me because of it. Also, from level 5 to level 26, the wands of choice I used we're the enchanting ones. They have really the best DPS out there until you hit 30, then the quest wands start looking ok.

I'm still fighting with myself on something though. I'm pushing to get to 40 so that I can get shadow form (cheer). But I've been wondering if I should stave it off until 45 to get the 5/5 in Wand Specialization in the Disc. tree, because wands are such an integral part of my DPS while leveling. Me thinks a tiny respec at 40 to see the dmg output. If I'm doing ok with the shadow form DPS, it stays and wand specialization can commence, but if the wand specialization is doing more, or just feels faster/better for whatever reason, might put the shadow form of DOOM on hold until 45.

Can I also say, being able to Silence again = bliss? Ahhh, I missed that on Cay. "Stupid caster is about to heal itself, Scream is down... Nooooooooo!" *mob at full health* /death.

/sigh

So yea, another thing. As awesome as it is soloing, GET A FRIEND FOR STRANGLETHORN VALE.

I hate that place, but since Doom and I started tackling the quests there together, my rabid loathing has toned down to just hating it. I'm not sure if the FP at the Rebel camp will make me like it any more. But suffice to say, if the Blizzard servers some how "forgot" that map, no love lost here.

So today and tomorrow's word count is severely lacking, I'm probably a day or two behind in word count. It's ok, I can make it up! ^.^ As more baby shadowing goes on, I'll keep people updated. As it stands, need to go back to SM for the quests and to get Whitmane's hat. Because it's good to have a back up ^.^