Wednesday (15 Sep) - Sister Svalna's Stampede

Wednesday (15 Sep) - Sister Svalna's Stampede

Wild was a bit ambivalent about the Wednesday night G2 ICC10 raid. As reported before, we seemed stuck at one boss and seemed to be losing focus on our ultimate goal, the Lich King. It was great to see that Bd was back from his hiatus. He joined the raid when invites when out, but when one of the tanks asked if he would be tanking with us, Bd said no, he was not in the raid to take anyone's place. Our two regular tanks were already in the raid. Bd also has a druid that he could use for healing, but we already had our three healers in place as well. It looked like Bd would hang around to see us off but would not be raiding with us.

This was also the second ICC10 night for the G1 group, so it was surprising that Bd was even available. The G1 was running late, even later than our G2 group, and when we got started toward 7pm Bd was still in the raid with us. He's a warrior and for the first time in a long time, he was able to switch to his melee Fury spec and kill things instead of tanking or healing. Bd was a very happy raider. It made for an interesting raid makeup, though. We had no DPS casters (mage, warlock, shadow priest, moonkin, etc) and our only ranged DPS were two hunters. Cr did not bring her holy priest on this run; instead, she brought an alt, a holy paladin.

We got started. Were were playing pretty sloppy. Pulls with raiders not ready, raiders dying and the group moving on, leaving healers behind trying to rez the dead, just in general half sleep-walking through it. We finally stumbled to Lord Marrowgar and started to pay better attention. With a little more focus, Marrowgar turned into an easy kill, and we moved on.

Deathwhisper - dead
Gunship - sunk
Saurfang - killed
Festergut - Wild died, I still don't know how I missed a spore. They killed
Festergut without me.
Rotface - He can give us trouble. Cr died and Wild rezzed her. Wild then
died. And they still killed Rotface despite losing two healers.
Dreamwalker - Saved! Our 1st attempt! 1st time we didn't wipe at least once.

Then there was Putricide. We lobbied to go to the Princes. Nope, we were told, let's take one shot at Putricide. The night's almost over. Our best attempt on Putricide in past raids was 44%. We need to get to 35% to get Putricide to the third and final phase. We took only one shot at Putricide, and it was the cleanest fight yet. Everyone was doing what they were supposed to do. We fought Putricide down to the 35% mark and entered the third phase. We had trouble with that phase, since it was the first time seeing it, but we got Putricide down to 28% before wiping. If we play like that Thursday night we'll bring that bad boy down.

Overall it was a heck of a night. We stampeded downed seven bosses in a single night and came closer than ever to our eighth. One of the drops on the night was [Sister Svalna's Aether Staff]. It's a two-hand staff with a lot of +hit on it, intended for DPS casters. Did I mention that we didn't have any DPS casters in the raid? Wild rolled on it for offspec and no one else wanted it. Wild wasn't sure he could use it in his moonkin set, but it was worth picking up. Wild could always shard it later and pass it to the raid leader.

The healing numbers were interesting. Wild was curious how Cr would do on her paladin, and how Pl (the other holy priest) was improving with the gear she'd been picking up. Here is a quick and dirty run down: W= Wild, C=Cr, and P=Pl. The order is by total healing, although the numbers are hps.

MG: W-4761, P-3686, C-3684
DW: W-2895, P-2513, C-2508
GS: W-2308, P-2006, C-1725
SF: C-3267, W-2650, P-2730
FG: C-5831, P-4126, W-5441 (Wild died 1/2 way through fight)
RF: P-4431, C-3424, W-3884 (Wild died again. Sigh)
DW: C-13729, W-13491 : Special heals, Wild was ecstatic that both of us were able to top 13k healing, which is why we were able to one shot this fight for the first time.
PC: C-4420, W-4140, P-4476 (P died twice, Wild once)

After the raid Wild played around with his moonkin gear set, trying to determine if the new staff fit in. The main advantage of swapping out Wild's current main hand/offhand pair of gear for the single two-hand staff is that Wild would give up around 200 spell power. That is a huge amount. The advantage that "might" mitigate that loss is that by adding the staff and it's 163 +hit, Wild could replace some of his lower ilevel +hit gear with higher ilevel non-hit gear. But would it be enough to offset the loss of spell power?

When Wild was finally done moving gear around, he found a combination of gear that he was really happy with. He enchanted the staff and added gems to the two slots, and was able to replace three older pieces of +hit gear with much better gear from his healing set, all of it while staying above the minimum level of +hit Wild needed to be effective as a moonkin in raids. In the final tally the only thing Wild had to give up was +haste. It would mean that Wild's spells would take longer to cast, but haste is not as crucial to a moonkin as spell power, crit, and intelligence are. Wild was surprised that he actually increased his spell power, from 3069 to 3106. His mana went up, as did his health, and his crit got a very nice buff up, from 22.27% to 25.41%. Wild loves the new staff.

Wild was getting ready to log when he decided to check mail. There was a note from Ando, asking Wild if he had a couple of enchants. They were older enchants, and neither were part of Wild's trained spells. One required some heavy farming, hoping to get the recipe, which was a rare drop. Wild had farmed for that recipe many times in his younger days, but it had never dropped for him. The other recipe could be purchased, provided Wild had Revered reputation with the Cenarion Expedition. Wild did not have that rep, but he was surprised to find that he was pretty close to getting it. Revered rep required 12,000 rep points. Wild had 10,535. There was only one place Wild could feasibly go to get that 1,465 rep (without having to get help) - and that was the Steamvaults, a five man level 70 dungeon in Coilfang Reservoir.

Wild has soloed several of the level 70 dungeons, but not the Steamvaults. Wild has attempted it, though, a couple of times, a great many days and weeks and months ago when his gear was far from where it is today. The effort didn't seem worth it at the time, so Wild just forgot about it. It was time to try it again. It didn't hurt that Wild was also anxious to try out his new moonkin gear set and that staff.

In the Steamvaults there are a lot of mobs, and they come in packs of 3-5 at a time. Wild knew enough to target and kill the casters first, particularly if they could heal, and that he could heal through just about anything that beat on him in melee range. Wild went back and forth between moonkin and caster form, and level 70 elite mobs died by the dozens.

Wild did not really know his way around, but all I was doing was killing things for rep, so it didn't much matter. If it breathed, Wild killed it. Eventually he stumbled over a boss, Mekgineer Steamrigger. The strategy called for watching out for the adds, for a sawblade, and being immobilized by an electric net. Wild killed the boss in seconds, and used Hurricane to turn the stunned adds into mush. Steamrigger was technically the second boss, but Wild soon ran across the first boss, Hydromancer Thespia. She had lots of interesting abilities, but they didn't do her much good against Wild. She died. Killing bosses was easier than the crowds of adds. At least Wild didn't have to re-target all the time against bosses. Well, except for the third and last boss, Warlord Kalithresh.

The Warlord fight was irritating because of a mechanic that required Wild to target and destroy clear, fluid filled tanks in the room whenever the Warlord channeled one of them. Just before he does that, he casts a spell reflect that bounces Wild's attacks back at Wild. Wild wanted to avoid that at all costs, as Wild could hurt himself a lot worse than the boss could hurt him.

Wild's strategy was to kill the Warlord before he cast spell reflect the first time. Unfortunately, I didn't think much beyond that, so when he was still standing when he cast spell reflect I was a bit at a loss. Wild had a couple of spells reflected back before Wild could stop casting. They hurt. A lot. The boss started channeling a tank. Wild knew he should target and destroy the tank quickly. Wild wasn't quick enough, though, and the Warlord enraged. Wild shrugged. How bad could his enrage be? I'll just heal through it.

His enrage was bad - very bad. He hit Wild so fast so many times Wild could not get off any heals except for his instants, and they didn't help enough. The boss was immune to Stomp and to Cyclone and entangling roots failed. Coupled with the damage Wild had already done to himself, things went from bad to worse.

Wild died.

Well, that was kind of embarrassing. But Wild had already gotten enough rep to make Revered, and Wild was out of time. Wild gave Warlord Kalithresh a salute. Next time we meet, Wild promised him, you'll die.

Wild swung by the Cenarion Refuge and got the enchant recipe that Ando needed. Wild hates grinding rep and farming mobs for rare recipes and such, unless it's because someone actually needs it. Then the effort has a purpose behind it and Wild is much happier going after it. Wild will get Ando his enchant, and perhaps the next time Wild heads for the Stemvaults, Naithipe will come along to video it.