Monday (16 Jan) - More Cata Dungeons

Monday (16 Jan) - More Cata Dungeons

JB got her dailies done and then dialed up a random dungeon. It was the Halls of Origination (HOO), one of two normal dungeons that give reputation for the Ramkahen faction. JB was wearing her Ramkahen tabard in order to get the rep. JB was fortunate again to have a great tank. The priest healer was pretty good, too. JB's DPS competition was a death knight and a shadow priest.

JB spent some time before the dungeon run playing with /assist macros. Thinking about how /assist worked hurt my head, but when I asked Shevils to join JB and actually use it, it made a lot more sense. Using assist comes in two parts. First, JB decides what player is going to be the assist player, and then marks that player with /assist. The second part was what I was having trouble with. How do you get the target of the assist player to be JB's target with one stroke? Well, I'm sure there was a macro that would do it, but instead I settled on an addon called SimpleAssist. SA let's me set the assit player with one button, and then use a second button as the target button, which always set's JB's target to whatever target the assist player has.

JB tried it out on trash mobs in HOO. It worked, but I had not placed my assist target button very well and it was awkward. Second, in a random five man who knows what the other DPSers are doing? JB tried using the DK as the assist player, but many times teh DK wasn't targeting anything, or was looking at the tank (probably so he could pick up the tank's target). Despite the problem of tanks switching targets for aggro reasons, JB decided that setting the assist on the tank was her best bet. The trick was whenever JB started getting hit, she'd re-target her assist to stick with whatever mob the tank was attacking. It's going to take some practice.

Back to HOO, it's a longish dungeon, but we cleared it pretty quickly. JB and the healer were the only deaths, and that occurred outside combat. We were on the center platform, which is also an elevator with no sides. Let's just say that there was a bit of confusion about which direction to go, we wandered about, and the elevator unexpectedly moved - the tank, healer, and JB fell off the platform - and to our deaths. Well, the tank survived it. JB reincarnated and then rezzed the healer, and we all had a good laugh at each other.

The rest of the run was uneventful. JB got some more practice and it showed in her numbers:

#1: tank, 11.7k dps, 34.3% of damage
#2: JB, 9.0k/26.3%
#3: dk, 7.3k/21.3%
#4: sp, 6.0k/17.6%

I think the tanks are coming in with DPS gear instead of their tanking gear.

JB remembered her totems this time and even sent in her fire elemental totem on the final boss. JB totally forgot about her berserk and bloodlust spells, though.

Later -

JB's final run of the night was another Lost City random dungeon. That gave JB a direct comparison between her first Lost City run and the second one. JB was more confident and decisive after three dungeon runs. JB again finished second in DPS with 9.2k, compared to the 8.0k dps JB got on the first Lost City run. It was a more balanced group with all of the DPS coming in over 8k dps and the tank DPSing like a tank.

JB wanted a fourth run, but the evening was getting late. JB waited twenty minutes, but no new run popped and she called it a night.