Wednesday Part 2 (7 Apr) - The (Sort of) Fun Stuff

Wednesday Part 2 (7 Apr) - The (Sort of) Fun Stuff

There really was a raid Wednesday night, and Wild was a part of it. At raid time we had only 24 signed up, and when the clock struck 6pm only 19 of those had made it in game. More raiders filtered in, and we took out the trash with 23 raiders. By 6:15pm or so, we were at full strength. Still, the raid is supposed to be in place and ready to go at 6pm for invites, and to ensure that, the invite time may be moved back, to possibly 5:50pm. Our healer group wasn't exactly balanced among the classes, either. There was Wild (druid) and Sb, one of three priests who most often heals, and then there were four shaman. At least there will be no lack of totems (a shaman specialty).

The Tuesday raid had taken down the four bosses in the Lower Spire, of course, as well as both the Princes and the Blood-Queen in the Crimson Halls. Six kills. We would be starting in the Plagueworks.

Wild had made some changes in both his healing and moonkin specs earlier in the day. Specifically for healing, Wild moved talent points around in order to get two talents called Celestial Focus and Nature's Grace. Both of these talents improve Wild's +haste, which I am getting a bit desperate to improve on. Wild also paid a staggering price for a belt [Professor's Bloodied Smock], an i264 drop in ICC that was for sale on the AH. It's the most expensive thing Wild has every purchased, but it was a huge upgrade and usually sells for a lot more. And it came with +80 haste (+90 haste after Wild socketed three gems).

On the trash mobs there was a noticeable improvement in the speed of Wild's spell casting. It is no where near equal with the other guild druid healers, but it made a difference. Wild put out over 4700 hps on the trash.

The addon that tracks dps and hps was a bit flaky on the night, and Wild had to reset it after each encounter. That made it a little more difficult to assess Wild's progress.

The first boss was Festergut. Wild got a new assignment for this fight. Usually Wild is assigned to one of two ranged groups that stand on the outer circle. A critical element of the fight is to get to a Spore when they spawn, which happens many times over the course of the fight. There are two spots on the outer circle where we gather around a spore, as well as a third spot at the center of the chamber where the tanks and melee are. This time Wild was assigned to position in the center with the melee and the tanks. I knew that spores could spawn on any raider, but I also assumed that spores spawning in the center should be held there so the raiders there could group around it. On the very first spore spawn, Wild got tagged with a spore. I held position, and then the raid leader started yelling at Wild to move. To be honest, I still don't fully understand under what conditions the center raiders must move with a spore to the outer circle. Three spores always spawn, but not always where each of our three positions can take advantage of them. I suppose that if I happen to get a spore, I need to look around and see which spot doesn't have one. Hard to see if a second spore is in the tightly packed center, though, with my own spore in my face. Nonetheless, Wild was supposed to bring his spore to the outer circle, with all the melee following. I tried to get to them, but I was too late. The explosion from the spores is not a problem, and in fact is essential. Exploding spores inoculate raiders from a stacking shadow damage debuff. The raiders Wild failed to reach would need a lot of extra healing until new spores spawned.

We were able to heal through it, no one died, and Festergut proved to be no match for the raid. Festergut went down.

Rotface was up next, and proved no better challenge. Rotface went down. Wild's hps on those two bosses put him in the bottom half of the healers, but the numbers were improving as Wild got used to the new casting speed.

From there, we had only two choices - Putricide (ugh), or Dreamwalker (please). We headed for Putricide.

Wild has gone over this fight more than a few times. It is gruelingly difficult. A single mistake is a near sure wipe. We've fought this maniac dozens of time - and killed him only once. It is the worst kind of fight for Wild. Almost constant movement, not just away from stuff, but toward stuff as well. Bad positioning won't necessarily kill you, but it will kill others, because being out of position puts other raiders at risk. It is an absolute nightmare. Wild certainly wasn't the only raider making mistakes, but I was cringingly aware of every one that Wild made.

Things actually started well, surprisingly. On our first attempt we got Putricide down to 14% health and Wild finished third in healing with 3891 hps.

One of those single mistakes (not Wild's) brought the raid down early on our second attempt. And we went at him again. And again. There are three phases to this fight. We were good enough to get to the third phase nearly every time, spending our blood over and over again in the extended battle, and then falling short.

We had single digit near kills of 8% and 6%, but we could not finish him off. After eight attempts we had to call it a night.

Wild averaged around 3200 hps over the course of those eight attempts, staying in the 3rd or 4th positions in healing each time. Given the nature of the fight, I was well pleased with Wild's healing. I still suck at positioning, though, and I certainly inflicted more than my share of pain on the raid. It was a rough night. But you know what the real irony is? [Professor's Bloodied Smock] drops from the Putricide fight. I can't kill him, but I did buy his belt. :-)

There was no announcement regarding using the lockout option to balance the encounters between two raid nights, but these things tend to move slowly. Getting input and making a final decision is subject to the availability of the raid officers, and getting a consensus takes time.