Tuesday (18 Oct) - Dogs and Spiders

Tuesday (18 Oct) - Dogs and Spiders

Wild found it very weird that our raid group for Tuesday night had the same ten raiders we finished the night with on Monday. On Monday the raid leader got teased because he kept forgetting to make healer assignments after telling us he was going to start doing that (instead of Wild usually doing it right before the tank starts pulling stuff). On Tuesday night the raid leader gleefully announced he didn't need to assign healers since we had the same tanks and healers we had last night! Of course, all three of us healers played dumb and pretended we didn't know what he was talking about. Maybe things were looking up with this group.

We started on the trash as usual, and unfortunately as usual we were five minutes into it when we wiped. The dog we targeted was pulled too close to a group of scorpions, the same error we made the night before. Instead of shrugging it off as usual, though, the raid leader yelled at us. That surprised a lot of folks, but it got their attention. There was some arguing, and finger pointing, and then we settled down and plowed through the trash. In record time we had flushed out the first boss, Shannox.

The raid leader didn't wait around for everyone to pick their noses or go to the bathroom or talk about the latest youtube video. On Shannox's first pathing past us, our raid leader led us into battle. The only raider late to the party was our ranged DPS shaman, who is late for everything. Wild was healing the dog tank, Sb, the same as the night before, but we worked out a better arrangement that would get Wild in range of the main tank on Shannox more often. Gn, the pally healer on the main tank, was doing great but any help Wild could provide greatly increased our chances of victory. Wild was actually bored with healing Sb, and Wild did not need to always be in range of him to keep him alive. The two of us played like we had a rubber band attached to us. Wild watched the movement of the dogs and Sb watched how things were going with Shannox, and we flexed as needed. It worked. When Gn was caught in a trap Wild was close enough to come in range and keep the tank up until she could be freed. Sb moved in closer to Wild so that Wild could break away once Gn was free, run to catch Sb and keep him up as well.

We brought the dogs down, but we'd brought them down several times the night before and were then overwhelmed by the escalating damage Shannox does once those dogs die. Gn's mana was running low but Wild had innervated early and was able to innervate a second time for the final push. Wild had used Tranquility last night in this situation, but that hadn't worked well with the tank taking heavy hits, so Wild went Tree Form this time, saving the Tranq if we still needed it.

We didn't need it. Shannox went down on the first attempt. Wild, and the guild, had our first Firelands boss kill. It was a little sad that the first Firelands loot drop had to be disenchanted. It was a leather feral piece. We had no rogue in the group and Wild was the only druid. Wild doesn't have a feral spec and never intends to have one. At least the guild got the shard. And, of course, we had our kill.

The raid moved to the corridor of the spiders. Wild has been down this corridor numerous times, but until now I didn't realize that all those trips were with the other raid group, Lady Hunter's group. Mf's group, this group, were getting their first look at spider land.

We had some funny moments. The first time players see that spider eating the head off a firebird is always good for a laugh and a shiver. Seeing the shield protected mobs that are the final challenge on the way to the boss also gets some "What the hell?!" moments as well. We did fine, though, and cleared through it all.

We all took a look at Beth'tilac hanging down from her web. The raid leader and his number two called for a five minute break so that those who had never seen the fight (which was everyone but Wild and another Lady Hunter raider, a warlock, who was with us) could watch the video. The two leaders then huddled on a private vent channel to discuss strategy (and to watch the video, too, I'm sure. :-) ). I loved it when someone commented, "Hmm, our raid leaders were so confident in us that they don't even have a plan for what to do after we killed Shannox." Funny and true, but then we hadn't exactly earned that vote of confidence until tonight.

The raid leaders returned, and Wild had his own scare. The raid leader assigned roles. Wild would be the healer climbing into Beth'tilac's web. Wait! Wild wanted to shout. I didn't have time to finesse Gn into volunteering for it! Wild mentioned that he had no experience with the web climbing role. The raid leader responded that most of the raid had no experience at all with this fight, which made Wild the most experienced. Even the raid leader was seeing this fight for the first time, and he was going up into that web as well. Sigh.

Honestly, it wasn't as bad as Wild imagined. Wild was afraid that he would not be able to see and get to the threads of web that other raiders were bringing down by taunting the webspinners and killing them. Once Wild was actively looking for those threads, though, they weren't all that hard to spot. What Wild and the tank had a hell of a time with was coordinating the ascent so that the tank arrived just ahead of the healer. If the healer arrives first, it's a one shot kill. Wild learned that first hand. If the tank has to wait even a few seconds before Wild gets up into the web, the tank died before Wild could get him healed. We made seven attempts. There were problems on the ground as well as up in the web, but getting the web crawling bit right is the key to the fight. I'm not sure a druid is the best healing class for that role, but Wild is definitely not good enough in that role yet. I know what it looks like, now, though, and Beth's days are numbered.

After the raid Wild and Happy made a compromise on Wild's effort to reach his 2005 haste rating. The price of the off-hand was not only too high, it wouldn't quite get Wild all the way to his goal, either. But a shoulder piece had recently been reposted with a very good price that Wild had also been looking at. The ilevel was the same (i378) as the shoulder piece Wild already had (Wild hates it when his upgrades don't change his gear ilevel), but the new piece had considerably more haste on it. Happy bought it, saving himself about 5k gold (had he bought the off-hand). Wild enchanted and socketed the new shoulder piece. Wild's haste rating is now 2010. Woot!