Monday (13 Feb) - Shoulders of Desperation

Monday (13 Feb) - Shoulders of Desperation

JB has been on a hot streak of gear improvement, but a replacement for her i333 shoulders still eluded her. She had a plan, though. The i378 [Betrayer's Pauldrons] drop from the last boss in Hour of Twilight, Archbishop Benedictus. JB decided to bypass the random dungeon finder and queue directly for Twilight, and was prepared to kill Benedictus as many times as necessary to get those shoulders. JB waited patiently for about twenty minutes before the queue popped. JB's first group banged through the dungeon pretty quickly, but Benedictus did not drop the shoulders. No matter, JB went to sign up again for another round - and found that the dungeon was now locked. It seems that JB can queue randomly as often as she wants, hoping that she gets the Benedictus dungeon, but can only queue for it specifically once per day. That really sucks, because even though JB's odds to get that dungeon randomly is three to one, in reality it's the dungeon Well of Eternity that comes up almost every time. Who knows how long it will take to get an upgrade to her shoulders?

Happy had his own title for Monday - Take a Deep Breath. Every now and then the server seems to take a breather. The Auction House slows to a crawl. The buyers evaporate. The sellers start getting nervous. Prices have been dropping for a couple of weeks. There has been some panic selling, which Happy has grabbed up and banked for future sales. Even the most sought after enchanting mats have been hit. Happy has spent a great deal of gold stocking up on the under priced stuff, but even Happy is starting to get a little nervous.

Happy worries that many raiders are getting maxed out on gear from Dragon Soul already, and if they aren't improving their gear then they don't need enchanting mats. A great many players are now spending their time running old dungeons to win good looking older gear they can use for mogging. Mogged gear needs no enchants. To add to that concern, all that dungeon farming and disenchanting of unwanted gear is increasing the mats available on the Auction House, further forcing down the prices.

Happy believes the market may be already establishing these cut rate prices as the new "normal" price. Mats like large brilliant shards and greater eternal essences have lost a third of their value, and the demand isn't high enough to move that lower price. Paradoxically, demand swings have kept the latest mats, such as greater celestial essences, at astronomical prices, but over the weekend those prices suddenly crashed big time. Happy continues to buy mats that he knows Wild and JB will still need, but has become more cautious and selective of "bargains" that are actually a reset normal price point. This is Happy's version of boss encounters, and he intends to defeat them all. He who has the most gold wins.

JB was in game at raid time on Monday night. This is the G1 raid, run by Mt and Sb. JB was not signed up, but I wanted to learn how well stocked this group is with raiders and, maybe, get JB a spot on their raid. The group made a permanent change to their raid start time this week, moving it from 6pm to 7pm. That will make it a lot easier for JB to be available, as I usually know by then whether we have plans or not for the evening. G1 filled on time, getting nine regulars pretty quickly. They were short one DPS spot, but JB need not apply, as they specifically wanted a ranged DPS. It was nice to know that JB was considered, however. Their raiding days seem backwards, but it makes sense when you think about it. Raid nights are Mon/Tues, but their "first" raid night is Tuesday. On Tuesday they start a fresh raid, with the following Monday being their second night. They are currently working on Hagara, the fourth boss. JB will hang out on Tuesday night, too, hoping to get lucky with an invite, and will also sign up for the raid. If she does get in, she'll have priority for the following Monday night raid.

JB also made a decision and bought the pvp shoulders. She paid a thousand gold of her own money so she wouldn't have to face Happy's glare. She had two reasons for her decision, one practical, and one superstitious. The practical reason is if she really wants in on guild Dragon Soul raids, coming with i333 gear is not the way to get an invite. Secondly, JB figured that if she coughed up all that gold for the i377 pvp shoulders, the shoulders that she REALLY wanted would certainly fall for her this week.

JB wondered how her gear now stacked up with other raid ready enhancement shaman in the guild. Here are the results:

Gear Scores: i350 (2), i354, i364, i375

Of those five above, I've only seen two of them in raids: Nj (i364), and Gc (i375).

JB's equipped gear score: i379

The only thing holding JB back is an open spot in the raid for a melee DPS. That could be a challenge, though, as JB isn't competing with just shaman. The three melee DPSers in the raid Monday night included a paladin, a rogue, and a death knight. All are i380+ raiders.

If JB doesn't get into the guild raid, she will take her chances with a PUG this week. 

And JB is seriously considering making her off-spec pve elemental. Then she'd be able to take on both melee and ranged DPS roles.