Tuesday (29 Mar) - Power Packed Fun

Tuesday (29 Mar) - Power Packed Fun

Tuesday's evening of pvp battlegrounds was among the most spirited that the Hunter Fortress Alliance team has had in awhile. The team had to wait a very long time before getting a Warsong Gulch battle, though - almost forty minutes.

It was worth it, though. At first it looked like the alliance had a solid edge, capping the first flag early on despite fierce fighting. The battle raged back and forth across the field and inside both faction home bases. There was very little free-for-all fighting. Instead, both sides worked effectively in small platoons. After a particularly intense exchange the horde caught up, capping our flag. With the score tied 1-1 both sides made repeated and daring moves to get that second flag cap, which we knew would probably be the winner. It was the alliance that finally capped the second flag, and that took the wind out of the horde sails. The battle raged on, but after 11 intense minutes we capped the third flag for the 3-1 win. I was actually surprised to see that the Alliance had taken the top five spots in damage dealing. The Horde sure made the most of their opportunities. See got a flag save and Speak capped one while Shevils led with 20 KBs.

The second match popped within a couple of minutes of the first. I thought we might be facing a pre-made group, considering the speed in which got a match, but it was just coincidence. As with the first match, the fighting was intense and initially well balanced. For more than half the fight the two sides were tied 0-0 and we had each taken the other's flag and expertly defended it. The Horde decided not to hide our flag from us, but waved it openly just beyond their graveyard.

Shevils and Bean were returning to the fight after dying, heading up past mid-field to join the alliance group keeping the horde from getting past us and after our own flag carrier. We saw Speak peel off and head for the horde base via the hillside path instead of into the tunnel that bored directly into their flag room. Bean and Shevils peeled off as well and followed Speak. See had had to leave after the first WSG, so it was just the three of us heading into the horde stronghold.

We paused out of range of the horde players that were rezzing at their graveyard. It is extremely rare in these battles for there to ever be a pause. One side or the other or both initiate immediate attacks. This time was different. We watched each other - three alliance hunters facing the horde flag carrier with three defenders, plus more horde players rezzing at the nearby graveyard. Speak moved us forward a few more yards and again paused. I could see a couple of horde off to our left, close enough that Shevils could have put a few arrows into them. But they hung back and Shevils restrained herself. Poo made some ammo.

We moved a few more yards closer and paused a third time. I was expecting them to attack, but they had apparently decided to wait us out. It was a mistake. During a moment when the graveyard was empty, we attacked. It was still the three of us versus the four of them, but we didn't have to kill them all. We only had to kill the flag carrier in order to give our own flag carrier a few seconds to cap the flag he was holding on the other side of the battle.

It was a titanic battle! We held our own, hammering at the flag carrier and harassing the healer that was trying to keep him alive. They had no where to go other than off the cliffside, where other alliance were down below ready to pick them off. Horde who were killed below rezzed at their graveyard and joined the battle against us. But we never let up, and the horde flag carrier fell. Mere seconds later we capped the horde flag for a 1-0 lead. Then all three of Hunter Fortress beat feet off that cliffside as the place was crawling with horde. That battle turned the tide and the alliance went on to win it, 3-0.

Speak led in total damage, although Shevils still edged him out in KBs. Shevils credits Poo, his monkey combat pet, for all those kills. One look at the nasty stuff he was hurling at them had them fleeing in horror - the smell alone was as deadly as a warlock's DoT. It's the over-ripe bananas he eats. That's his secret weapon.

Despite the challenge of moving up into a new bracket last week, Hunter Fortress remains undefeated.

Hunter Fortress closed up shop for the evening and night crawling Kire and Sista came out to play. As told by Kire:

After all the kiddies hit the hay, Sista and Kire got together for some dungeon run fun. Rather than using the random dungeon finder for extra loot neither of the two needed and getting a random dungeon, they decided to select a dungeon they wanted to, and had yet to, run. The dungeon we chose was Dire Maul North, which is the Ogre wing, and the highest level of the three DM zones. We queued up and almost instantly got a group, and we started the dungeon well despite some minor glitches that would come back to haunt us later on. Kire was a little worried about how low the paladin healer was allowing his health to get even against trash mobs and at some point during one of the boss fights Kire died. Luckily the boss was almost dead and Kire got a lovely battle res from Sista and was able to regain aggro and finish the boss off. Kire rarely dies in dungeon runs since level 30 as the tank, and dying against a boss that really wasn’t hard was a bad sign, but it was a sign of things to come. It all went downhill when we got to the second to last boss.

The second to last boss is named Captain Kromcrush and he has some very nasty ability combinations; he fears everyone within 10 yards, calls two additional mobs, has a mortal cleave, which wounds the target causing damage and reducing healing effectiveness by 50%, enrages and counterattacks. Here is an excerpt from wowhead with other’s experiences with him:

"I have trouble on this guy every time. Yesterday was the first day i had done this instance in over two years and i had no clue what this guy did. So when he feared us i was right at the end of the tunnel so i got feared into a group in the courtyard area, no problem i could tank them and the healer was doing fine, then he spawned the adds and i hadn't noticed in time so when i got to them the healer was dead. This guy imo is a bit too hard when you don't have reliable crowd control. MS + Fear + Adds...it's just all too much."

In short, this was way too much for our poor group to handle. We ended up wiping on him at least 5 times, which included several attempts to both kick the tank (Kire) from the group and to kick the healer from the group, both being unsuccessful. We tried many different strategies all being equally unsuccessful. After 6+ attempts on him someone finally decided to put on the optional ogre suit to allow us to talk to him and pass by him without fighting him. It saved our evening, and we waltzed by him and took on the last boss and destroyed him with no problems. It was a rough experience though, and probably the most trouble I have had with a dungeon since probably Sinstar’s early days.

We had also tried a quick Arathi Basin bg before running the dungeon, and both Kire and Sista discovered that they weren’t up to par in pvp and we were part of an alliance team that got slaughtered by the horde.

The only thing that made the night successful for the twosome was the last dungeon run of the night in Zul’Farrak. We breezed through that dungeon killing all of the bosses and completing many quests. It was a fun run. Both Kire and Sista started the night at level 46 and Sista finished the night at 48 and Kire finished at 49. It is time to try new dungeons!