Tuesday (26 Jan) - Going Deep in ICC25

Tuesday (26 Jan) - Going Deep in ICC25

There was a moment of pure panic when Wild logged in Tuesday night. Wild came in game in Dalaran at one of the armor shops where Wild usually repairs his gear. The world formed around him, the comforting signs of a bustling city all about. But as the instant of joining the world stretched into seconds, and Wild's gear failed materialize to enfold him, a stab of panic struck - No! Have I been hacked?! Will I find the bank looted and all Wild's worldy goods sold off?

Thankfully, no. The Tuesday maintenance was a nasty one, and the world of WoW was moving veeerrryy sloooooowly. It took more than twenty seconds for Wild to get his clothes on. The lag was so bad Wild gave up trying to use the mailbox, and the raid leader for the night's run was telling everyone as they came in game - get out of Dalaran and get to Icecrown Citadel as early as possible or risk getting stuck trying to log in or travel. The lag was so bad that players in Dalaran on an alt would log out and log back in on their main - and their alt would still be standing there. The joke was "It could be worse. You could log back in on your main and find your alt looting your bank." One reason why many guilds do not schedule raids on Tuesdays.

But we were now raiding on Tuesday, so Wild hightailed it in slow motion to Icecrown Citadel. Or, he almost did. Wild had not quite gotten out of Dalaran when a guildie friend whispered Wild, asking if I wanted to get the frost random dungeon done. Well, thought Wild, I really like to have more time to get mentally ready for the raid . . . but, I did need to get that daily done, and no better way to do it than with guildies. Wild said sure, and a few minutes later we found out where we were headed - Culling of Stratholme (CoS). Sigh. This is one of the longer dungeon runs, with tons of trash mobs and a scenario where an npc (Arthas, no less) controls the pace of our progress (meaning that there was a lot of waiting around for the npc). It was well after 5pm by the time we finished, and when Wild reappeared back in Dalaran, the lag was even worse.

Wild did get to Icecrown Citadel this time. Soon came the first announcement from the raid leader, letting us know that there were 35 players signed up for the 25 spots in the raid. The nasty lag had also reached into and choked the raid calendar tool, and the raid leader was having a heck of a time getting players assigned to the raid. In the process he goofed and actually sent out raid invites before he was ready. Hmm, thought Wild, I didn't see a raid invite. Wild hoped that wasn't a bad sign.

As the raid start time approached the raid leader asked all those who had been confirmed to come on vent to discuss filling the final spots. Wild checked the raid calendar, but it wasn't talking. There was no way to tell if Wild was confirmed or not. So I got on vent anyway. Even with all that raid invites still managed to get out (the real invites) by 6:10pm, and Wild was in.

The troubles weren't over, though. Two raiders found that they could not enter ICC. In fact, the instance portal did not even appear for them. Attempts by a warlock to Summon them directly inside also failed. In desperation the two relogged, wondering when they did so how long it would take to get logged back in. Eventually, finally, and ultimately, we were all inside and ready to go.

We started with six healers, including three druids, although not the same three as last week. Our old uber druid, who I was surprised to find out had switched to another guild, was running with us, in addition to the heir apparent uber druid in the guild (no, that's not Wild, I'm not heir apparent to anything :P ).

We worked through the trash mobs with no problems and arrived at Lord Marrowgar. Wild knows this fight from the ten man raid, but I wondered if the same strategy would be used in 25 man. Fortunately for Wild, it was, and I was glad that at least for the first boss I felt comfortable with the fight. Wild was raid healing and tank HoTing. My main concern was to keep the heals flowing, and not to die. Wild achieved both, and Lord Marrowgar went down.

He dropped [Frozen Bonespike], and Wild's jaw dropped to the floor when I saw the stats on this ilevel 264 main hand dagger. If Wild had not been anchored by the roots of his tree form I think he might have fainted with desire as well. He certainly swooned. Among other juicy stats, the dagger added close to +200 spell power over his current weapon, an increase of such magnitude it would leap frog Wild to a whole new gear level. Wild got the shakes when he rolled an 88 out of 100. Mg, the other guild druid in the raid, rolled a 93. Wild sagged.

Wild put himself back together and prepared for the next encounter. Coming up was Lady Deathwhisper. And of course a chance at more of the insane loot in ICC25.

Lady Deathwhisper is a DPS fight. The boss starts with a large mana shield that she hides behind and can't be hit. Over the course of the fight the DPS hammer that shield to break it down. In the meantime waves of mobs attack from both sides of the room. The raid is divided into three groups, a tank group to attack the shield, a melee group to handle melee mobs, and a ranged group to handle caster mobs. The trash mobs can also reanimate themselves and that has to be watched out for. That's Phase 1.

Wild was aligned with the ranged group as well as assisting with heals on the tank in that group. The main thing Wild had to look out for was getting aggro from incoming mobs and the circle of Death and Decay the mobs cast around themselves. We made it through phase 1, bringing down all of the mobs and then breaking down the Lady's mana shield. Lady Deathwhisper then brought out her own big guns and the battle redoubled as she attacked. Phase two puts great pressure on the tanks and the tank healers, while she still lashes out at the raid with one shot kill Frostbolts. Unkillable Shades also glide through the raid dealing death with a touch. Staying out of their reach is our only defense.

Frostbolts can be interrupted before they are cast, but some were getting through, and one got Wild, killing me instantly with the Lady at 49%. Three others were already dead by that time. The raid fought on, and brought her down. It was Wild's first kill. Wild did not have a chance to swoon at any loot this time, which was probably good for the sake of his heart.

The third encounter in the Lower Spire wing of ICC is the Gunship Battle. Every now and then Blizz throws in fun encounters that are not that difficult just to provide a change of pace. The gunships in this encounter are the horde and allie air ships Orgrim's Hammer and Skybreaker which ply the skies of Icecrown. The two ships come at each other like ships of the line from the days of sail. Captaining the enemy ship is Deathbringer Saurfang.

Getting to the pier where our ship waits requires taking an open elevator platform to the top level of the Citadel. Wild didn't know this, having never gotten past the Lady Deathwhisper fight. I got left behind. Sigh. Not to worry, though, I found the danged thing and got to the pier in plenty of time to board the ship.

I had read about this encounter and knew that the raid would break up into two groups, one which would stay on the ship, and the other which would storm the enemy ship. The raid leader was just starting to explain, and no assignments had been made, when the ship began moving. Someone had started the encounter.

We tried to ride it out, the raid leader calling out instructions and trying to get us organized as the two ships came into view of each other. Raiders jumped on the four cannon at the sides of the ship and began hammering the enemy ship. We closed to grappling range. Raiders started jumping to the other ship. Other raiders, equipped with jetpacks (yes, I said jetpacks!) took flight to the other ship as well.

Cannon from the enemy ship started raining shells down on our ship. Ranged mobs fired off clouds of arrows at us as well. The air hummed with activity. And the lag struck.

Wild's "instant" spells suddenly took upwards of ten seconds to cast. The whole raid was hit with it. Even the cannon fire went into slow motion. Wild could see raiders die and then see their health bar light up from Wild's heal - after the raider was already dead. Raiders who jumped to the other ship discovered the enemy ship had swung out of reach while the lag held them, and they fell to their death. Things went from barely under control to out of control, and after a few minutes of this the raid leader called a wipe.

For the second attempt no one was allowed to board the ship until the strategy had been talked out and roles assigned. Wild was originally assigned to the boarding party (that storms the enemy ship), but when they learned I hadn't done this fight before, they switched me to ship defense, which would give me a better feel for the fight.

Starting the encounter requires talking to an npc, and we placed a raider next to him to keep anyone from starting things early. That was halfway in fun, but just to put a point on it that talking to npcs when you didn't know what would happen was generally a bad idea.

We started again. Things went very well - until the lag struck again, and we simply couldn't cast spells. We tried to fight through it, but we finally had to call a wipe for the second time. We decided to take a long break - ten minutes - to see if the lag would go away. The raid leader was really chomping at the bit to get to the fourth boss, which we have yet to kill, and the lag was costing us precious time against an encounter they knew we could beat.

Following the break we went at it a third time. There were periods of lag, but for most of the fight we were able to cast. I loved the fight! There are enemy mages that freeze our cannon, enemy boarders we have to repel, our own teams storming the enemy ship, retreating when Saurfang's Battle Fury reaches untankable levels, and then returning once that wears off. And seeing all the fun the jetpack players were having. Wild danced around the deck, avoiding the enemy cannon fire, healing through multiple arrow shots, and generally having a whale of a time. We won!

One of the drops was [Boots of Unnatural Growth], the finest pair of ilevel 264 leather caster boots Wild had ever seen. Wild rolled a 59. That was the highest roll until the other non-guildie druid in the raid rolled a - 55. Wild won the roll! Wild's first ilevel 264 gear.

From there we stepped off the boat to the pier and the battle with Deathbringer Saurfang, who it appears survived the gunship battle.

Wild happened on this fight in last Friday's ICC25 when we spent the whole evening wiping on this boss. We didn't get close that night.

On Tuesday the strategy discussion began with a major debate over how to handle a Saurfang ability called Mark of the Fallen Champion. Raiders with the Mark get "splash damage" with every hit Saurfang gets on the tank. The Marked raider requires massive healing for as long as the Mark is active, but while getting healed it increases another ability, Blood Boil, that is used to cast more Marks. If the raider dies Saurfang gains back 5% of his health. When your health is in the millions, 5% is a lot.

The discussion was about whether to let raiders with the Mark die or to try to keep them healed. Depending on how fast Saurfang gains Blood Boils, there could be more than one raider with the Mark, making healing even more desperate. We didn't really know what would work until we tried, so after a bit of confusion we healers decided we wanted to try to keep folks alive.

Saurfang has many other nasty things to worry about, putting even more pressure on healers, and of course no boss fight would be complete unless there were other mobs running amok; in this case they were called blood beasts. And if we ever managed to get Saurfang to 25% health, that's when he gets REALLY mad. About the only good thing about this fight is that it does not require much movement from the healers. Wild could pretty much stand in one spot the whole fight, as long as I was careful to keep a reasonable distance from other raiders to avoid an attack that jumps to nearby raiders.

On our first attempt we got Saurfang to 44% before wiping, by far our best attempt since we started pounding on this orcish boss.

On our second attempt we got him all the way down to 22%, getting a little ways into the "really mad" phase where he Frenzies. Our problem was still with the Marks, however. By the time we wiped there were six raiders with Marks, and we just couldn't keep everyone healed. We only had about ten minutes left, not enough time to set up a strategy change. We were close, too, and thought that maybe one more try might get us there. We'd hit a wall, though. On our third attempt we stalled again, with a raid best 21%.

We had to call it, having still not downed this boss. But confidence was growing, and we were starting to see that we could indeed take this guy.

Wild was not very high on the healing meters, and I'm going to do some comparisons between Wild and the other two druids in the raid, which I'll report separately. The healing leader for the raid also sent Wild an email later on saying there would be a meeting of healers before the Wednesday run. Wild will be running with MM, but I should have time before the raid to join in the discussion.

Wild took a peek at the DPS for the evening, and wow was I impressed! A rogue led in damage dealing with 6672 DPS. Over 6k! Wild can barely do 3k DPS in moonkin form, and I was feeling a little smug as Wild generally leads the DPS in the 5 man heroic runs.

In fact, five raiders topped the 6k DPS mark in the raid. Five more topped 5k DPS, and three more broke 4k. Our raid leader and the sole moonkin in the raid came in with 4454 DPS. Far above where Wild is now, but at least that looks more achievable than the 6k others are reaching.

I also looked at who was getting those numbers. Six of the top seven DPSers were transfer guildies. The best DPSer among the rest of the guildies was the melee shaman who generally leads all our DPS - he was over 6k, but finished 4th. There's no question that the transfer guildies provide a massive influx of powerful DPS to the guild.