Why 10 is better than 25

I know its an inflammatory topic and I am being totally flippant when I say it, but I think 10-man raiding is a lot more intense than 25-man.

And I have come to this conclusion because one of our healers could not get his computer to cooperate last night.

He kept disconnecting randomly in our fights. Now in most standard encounters in a 25 man, unless you are the main tank or in a critical role, a disconnect will not necessarily lead to a wipe, just a hiccup that can usually be covered by other playes. In a group of 10, any missing (or dead) member severely complicates things. So in our encounters last night, we had several moments where our healing output was cut by 33% due to the healer's frequent DC's, and as us 2 remaining healers picked up the slack and struggled to keep the raid alive, the intensity went up as well.

Heart pounding, near misses, close saves, very intense. Likewise, if a dps dies (*usually* not my fault) then there is the question, will adds be burned down in time before the next wave, or maybe will the boss enrage? Basically the stakes are higher - each player represents 10% of the raid, not 4% as in a 25 person raid.

I've mentioned before my guild is not a powerhouse hardcore organization, but we have a core group and we all rely on each other. If more than one core member cannot log on, usually we can't get very far. Everyone relies on each other more. Blizzard rewards 25 man groups with better gear, but when you think about it, 10 man groups are just as challenging, if not moreso. In any case, I find it much more rewarding and exciting than a 25-man raid.

It's really cool to see 25 people bear down on a boss with all kinds of spells and attacks flying back and forth, but when you boil it down to the essence of the group dynamic, the real thrill is when your contribution counts so much more to everyone else's efforts, and vice versa.

Back in the days of 40 person raids, it was easy to get lost in the crowd. You could AFK for a boss fight and no one would notice. Scaling down to 25 people made it more manageable, but unless you are on a hard mode, some people could be on the phone or watching a movie while tapping keys and a boss would still go down. In 10-mans, everyone has to be on their game. Likewise, if someone gets frozen or rocketed or fails to fulfill their role, it is often glaringly obvious to other guild members, so tensions likewise are also heightened. You can really get immersed in the struggle for survival and the epicness of the event when you know each heal and each attack counts.

I know there are 25 man stalwarts who hold the opposite opinion of mine, but I wanted to speak up for the few, the proud, the 10-manners (womaners too!) out there enjoying themselves despite the lesser rewards.

/ramble off

It's business...it's business time!

Living in Japan kind of constricts your access to Western culture. Sure we get Transformers movies and Harry Potter and anything else with worldwide appeal. But I just got wind of the Flight of the Conchords, which I understand has been around for a couple years now. Funny, funny stuff. If you haven't heard 'Business Time' yet, look it up on youtube. Anyways, it was Business Time in Ulduar as we cleared many more bosses.

I take back what I said about my guild dying, it was just a bad slump for a couple weeks that I misread. I was being a bit too pessimistic as I had bad experiences in the past.

Auriya went down after about 7 attempts, getting the pull and movement down.
Thorim went down in 2 attempts. One of the easiest encounters in Ulduar so far.
Hodir went down in about 10 attempts, we all got our frost resist gear on and that helped a lot.
Freya went down in 3 attempts, it was surprisingly easier than anticipated.

We are now on Mimiron, and our best attempt was getting him down to about 25% on phase 4, which is like having the encounter down to 5%. He did an aoe shock and a laser barrage at the same time, which threw off some members of our raid who got gibbed.

OK, it was me >_<
I have to take the blame sometimes too.

My raid healing guide I wrote earlier applies to a lot of these encounters. Rejuv and Wild growth as much as possible, and swiftmend/nourish targets low on health. On Mimiron all healers need to help out with direct healing on Plasma Blast, which is 20k damage a second for 6 seconds. On Thorim you have to heal your group and your group's tank, its like a mini Heroic Dungeon wave (I healed the group that stays in the coliseum).

Alt Update:

My priest is at level 55, closing in on 56. I've gotten a lot better at skipping quests I know take too long when I can be off doing something more efficient. For example, there are many quests in Felwood that require you fighting past many demons to get to a pool or something, going back, then having to go back in again. And Felwood is all stretched out and quests are rarely clumped together. Not the best place to quest. I did the furbolg quests, made the trip back and forth twice, and then got the hell out of there. Winterspring has many more quests involving killing things in localized areas.

After that I'll do the Western Plaguelands and some Eastern Plaguelands and Silithus, and then I should be ready to head to the Outlands at level 58 or 59. My usual strategy would have been to go into Outlands at level 56 and farm high-experience mobs until level 58, but with the heirloom item XP bonus questing should be about the same or faster, and a little less monotonous. I'm committing the alting sin of playing without rested experience, but I'm having a good time and its a nice change of pace from raiding.

3.2: Emblem-o-mania

According to the new patch notes, when 3.2 hits, all Heroic Dungeons and T7 content (Naxx, EoE, OS, Vaults of Archavon) will drop Emblems of Conquest! This is a huge change especially for me.

For those not familiar:

Emblems of Heroism=ilvl200 gear (baseline, starter epic items)
Emblems of Valor=ilvl213 gear (Equal to 25-man Naxx drops)
Emblems of Conquest=ilvl226 gear (Equal to 25-man Ulduar drops)

Now, I can run dungeons, OS, or Naxx with any of my 80's, and earn badges towards rewards that match Ulduar's in most cases. And when my lower level characters hit 80, they can start earning gear that brings them up to speed with the current content.

Some may complain that they ran a million heroics or Naxx every week and they cashed out their Emblems (or have hundreds rotting in their currency screen) and now newbies can run in and start earning gear much higher in quality for doing the same thing. That is the nature of MMO's - I remember 3 years back, having to grind mobs purely for their XP between quests because the XP gain slowed down around level 40. Now my alts earn levels incredibly fast - I ran Zul'Furak *once* at level 44 or so, and the combined experience from mobs and quests in that one run was enough for an entire level's worth of XP.

The first time I hit 60 waaaay back vanilla WoW, it took me about 12 days /played I think. Now you can hit 60 in half that time, and even faster with heirloom items, rested XP, or refer-a-friend. The game changes and evolves, get used to it.

As for positive changes to the game this Emblem change will bring (from my perspective at least):

You will have geared players going back to Heroic dungeons. Sure it will be a faceroll for many, but this will be a chance to try new specs or new roles while the emblems go towards your main spec. I am looking forward to trying some retribution Paladin or feral Druid runs while earning badges for my protection Pally and resto Druid gear sets.

Newer players will get a boost as their fellow PUG members may have better gear and/or experience in the dungeon. You will still have some /fail PUGs with That Guy who wrecks it for everyone, but short of a /kick the overgeared members will be able to compensate. With DPS doing 4k regularly nowadays, 4-man runs will become more common too. (Heroics assume about 1.5k-2k dps x 3)

You will have more chances to try for achievements. As more players will be outgearing the dungeons, you will have a better chance to earn achievements that were designed for much less powerful players. In an incidental change, drakes in Occulus and EoE will scale with gear, like vehicles in Ulduar. This means these previously difficult-to-master (and difficult to PUG) encounters will become slightly easier to manage as well.

Personally, I don't know how I will manage my time between all my characters anymore. My main Msmoo, has been finished with Heroic dungeons for months now, and my Paladin has been too for a while. For guild Naxx runs, my Pally went while my Druid was benched as there were zero upgrades for me to be had. I could expect any Heroic dungeon running would be on my mage, my other 80 at this stage. Now any of my 80s stand to gain from a Heroic dungeon run or Naxx run. If any other of my characters hit 80 it will get even tougher to choose. I guess it will come down to what I feel like playing at the moment. Which is, as they say, a Good Thing :)

Nevermind all the other stuff in 3.2, like a new battleground, revamped older battlegrounds, and the new Coliseum instances. Too much for a guy with a bunch of alts!

Ulduar raid healing for druids

In my last post, I lamented the downturn my guild was facing as our progress slowed more and more in the face of 'guild death'. There has been no progress since my last post. We didn't even attempt Ignis this week because we don't have a reliable ranged dps to burst down brittle golems.

I've seen some guides to healing in Ulduar, and I think the reason such guides have come up is that raid damage is much higher in Ulduar than in Naxxramas or other pre 3.1 content. The raid damage is either constant and random across many members (Razorscale's devouring flame), or in big predictable bursts against the whole raid (Deconstructor's tympanic tantrum). While I have only been up to Auraiya I have come up with some druid-specific strategies for healing that I think healing druids new to Ulduar will find useful. While I'm not an endgame hardcore min-maxed uber raider, I pride myself in keeping my raid alive to the best of my abilities.

Recommended Glyphs
Wild Growth: 6 targets healed is better than 5. 'Nuff Said
Swiftmend: Some nice burst healing without sacrificing your HoT
Nourish: Not so important if you have T7 4 piece, but a nice boost as nourish is your main direct heal in Ulduar.
*Glyph of Innvervate in place of Nourish if you are having mana issues, but I can't say as I hardly go OOM. I usally end up innverating our shaman or paladin now that we can :) As far as gear goes, if you are in all healer-oriented epics (No +hit, wannabe Moonkins!) you should be fine.

Also get the Idol of Awakening ASAP. It is worth the 25 valor emblems if you were not lucky enough to get it in a Naxx 25 run. The idol reduces your rejuvenation mana costs significantly, and rejuvenation will be a primary source of raid heals. This idol is way more useful than the lifebloom idol.

A guildie once asked me about itemization, gems and enchants for Resto druids. This is my preference: Spell Power>Spirit>Intellect>Haste>Crit. Try to keep a balance. Once your spirit gets up to about 900-1000, stop going for it and focus on spellpower. I usally make sure I get all my gem socket bonuses, so get Spi/Spell Power purple gems if you need to fill a blue socket, and Spell Power/Int gems if you need to fill a Yellow Socket.

Haste and Crit comes on all your gear anyways - crit is devalued for druids as most of our healing spells cant crit, and Regrowth and Nourish are propped up by talents already (+25% to crit). Haste is still a so-so benefit because so few of our spells have casting times, and we have nature's grace to speed up our casting after a crit anyways. True, haste reduces the GCD so more HOTs can be cast in a shorter amount of time, but to me that benefit feels negligble compared to the amount of haste required. So in any case, let those stats come as they are on your gear, but don't go out of your way to get them. Anyhoo, back to Ulduar.

A general Ulduar raid healing strategy:

Rejuvenation: Cast this as often as possible, on someone that does not have it. Its nice to have on the tanks, but its more important to focus on raid members. By keeping up rejuvenation on as many targets as possible:
-Any player can be thrown a quick Swiftmend if need be.
-In times of lots of movement, if you are out of range they are still getting some healing from you.
-If they end up needing a nourish or two (they are thrown into Ignis's pot, or grabbed by Kologarn), they stand to get to %20 benefit straight away.
-If you have 4pc T8, which adds an instant heal equal to one tick on each cast, it gets even more effective.

In a 10-man, you can usually have rejuv ticking on most of the raid if you stay in range of all of them. It lasts 18 seconds (talented), which is just about the time it takes to cast one on each member (including yourself). Then, start all over again. If you find yourself standing still doing nothing, you probably ought to be casting a rejuvenation on someone, unless there is a definite lull.

Your other HOT of choice is Wild Growth. I usually cast it on the tank or a melee. They are usually the most clumped up and stand to get greatest benefit. Of course, there are many times when casters clump together and the cast will hit many at once. Don't spam it for the sake of spamming it though. If there is a Kologarn Oblivion or other big hit to the raid you want to have the spell ready and not on cooldown, to cast right away.

Lifebloom is a tricky spell now. I never 'roll' it anymore, its a huge mana sucker. I will cast this as a supplementary HOT on someone after I rejuv'd them. Popular targets are light bomb/gravity bomb holders, tanks, and that guy you know is slow to move out of void zones.

Nourish is for clear, targeted, heavy damage. Ignis Pot, Fusion Punch (helping the tank healer), aggro on dps, and that guy you know is slow to move out of void zones.

If I'm feeling saucy, I'll cast Regrowth on a tank just for a little more padding for them. the 24 second HOT, to me, is more valuable than casting a lifebloom that costs much much more to get 24 seconds of coverage.

The key to heal this way is to 'trust' your HOTs to do their job. Most of the raid damage comes in intervals, and if someone's bar drops to 50% or less, you usually have a period of time to bring that back up. So don't panic - a single rejuv can heal 10,000 HP or more running its full course. By keeping rejuvs running on the raid, as soon as someone takes damage, they start ticking back up, slowly but surely.

To bring it all together, let's use iron council (10-man) as an example.
After Steelbreaker is brought over to his tanking position, I place mayself between him and and the tank who is keeping Mr. Rune and Mr. Storm occupied. This way I have all the raid members in range. (Take care to stay 30yds from Mr. Storm or his aoe pulse will do massive damage to you).

I am casting rejuv's in sequence onto all raid members including myself. When fusion punch comes up, I take a moment to cast a nourish or two on the tank to help the tank healer smooth out the massive damage he takes. Then I go back to rejuv's on the raid. If I notice someone is a bit low, I will follow the rejuv with a wild growth if they are in a clump, or with a lifebloom, if they are by themselves. When Steel goes down, I focus on keeping tanks up and healthy in the transition, then I go back to refreshing rejuv's on the raid. I save my wild growth and swiftmend for death runes and errant lightning balls, which can do a lot of damage quickly to random players. In the final phase against Mr. Storm, WG and Swiftmend are used a lot in the lightning bolt storms. Then the boss dies and we all /cheer. The End.

As I described it, casting constantly, you may think I would be OOM rather quickly. While I do go through a full bar of mana, with an innervate and a mana pot handy I have never gone completely OOM in any encounter, and in most cases neither aid is necessary. If you spammed Rejuvenations nonstop from start to finish, you would probably OOM before you should. It is crucial to follow the pace of the encounter and anticipate when your healing is needed. It's fine to stop casting and enjoy watching everyone's health bars tick up while you stand there getting mana back, but if you don't start back up before some large incoming damage, you may find yourself too far behind for your non-instant heals to do their job.

Just a little explanation of what has worked for me in Ulduar up to now. I hope in the near future I can progress further into Ulduar and get a little more insight about the second half of the dungeon. A lot of this advice probably doesnt apply to General Vejax, where all mana regen is disabled, or in some other encounters, but I would love any feedback or ideas about druid healing in Ulduar for any boss.

My Guild is Terminal Stage...

I'm in a situation I've experienced many times in guilds, and I can see how it's going to end. My guild is dying. It might look fine on the surface, but it is slowly, surely dying. This is not about a single member or loot or any drama - my guild is not dying because some genius stood in the fire last night and wiped the raid. That can be 'cured'. This is an interminable sickness that will ultimately break up the guild if not addressed soon. Here are some symptoms:

-Scheduled raids get canceled more and more frequently due to attendance issues.
(Players are not interested in logging on, would rather play other unguilded characters, or have real life responsibilities)

-Although we have scheduled raids starting on the hour, things never get going until half past. Players are not prepared or ready to go on time.
(Late players, Tank/offset gear is in the bank, busy respeccing to raid spec, hearthing to get missing reagents/consumables...)

-Sloppy play once in the raid.
(AFKs, slow wipe recovery, muddled tanking/healing/dps assignments leading to wipes)

-Low levels of guild management.
(Almost zero recruiting by guild leadership to fill gaps in roster, new members are far below level cap and will not be raiding for weeks/months from when they join. Chronic healer/tank shortages.

-Some key players have constant connection problems. We spend on average 20-30 minutes per night waiting for offline players, and usually one or two attempts a night are wipes partially, if not fully due to disconnects.

I'm not claiming to be completely free of all of these symptoms, but I am always on time and prepared, and when I make a mistake I know why and rarely repeat it. I feel like I am contributing more to the guild than I am getting back from it.

Since my last post, where two weekends ago we finished half of Ulduar very rapidly, we have not even gotten past Ignis. Its really frustrating to wipe over and over on a boss we conquered for two consecutive weeks. I'm sure I'm not the only guildie feeling down about it.

All of the above symptoms, individually, can be overcome with corrective action. But combined together, they sap the energy and momentum of a raid, and waste everyone's time. This is especially important as our core group have only about 2-2.5 hours of raid time a night. When we start late, and 30 minutes or more is wasted for various reasons, it gets old quick. If things aren't turned around soon, the death of the guild is inevitable. I have seen it happen many times to guilds I'm in. Overall activity is down in spite of recent progression, the MT is often MIA, and more raids are called than actually take place. I know a dying guild when I see it.

I have had some conversations with the guild leader and his attitude is a mix of 'It will get better this weekend/soon' and 'It can't be helped, just do with what we got'. It's nice to have faith in your fellow guildie, but to me all the inconsistency is frustrating and to a degree inconsiderate to fellow guildies.

I've considered myself a casual player in that I cannot always log on consistently the same time to match a regular raiding schedule. I don't like 'teh srs bznss' aspect of WoW that can cause stress and drama. I gravitate towards casual guilds with loose structures. Often, these guilds eventually implode, but I am used to it. I am complacent to have a guild dissolve around me, then go off in search of a new one. But now, after raiding regularly for the first time since vanilla WoW (I don't think I entered a single PVE raid from June 2006 to September 2008), I'm hooked, and I'm looking for a place to play.

For the second time in my WoW career, I am thinking of leaving a guild I am heavily invested in. The last time I left a guild was in 2006, when I was in a hardcore progression guild with a crazy schedule and overzealous leadership - it was too hardcore for me. This time the guild is too lax! Where oh where are you, Perfect Guild That Matches Me Perfectly?

After tonight's raid, I am going to let the GL know that I plan on looking for another guild if the situation doesn't improve soon. I don't want to /ragequit after a bad wipe, or sneak on and /qguit when no one can see, or avoid logging on even if I want to. Perhaps this is just a lull and it will improve. But I don't think I can cling to this sinking ship much longer.

Fun Ulduar is Fun

I tried raiding way back when Molten Core was the place to be, but burned out in a couple months. During The Burning Crusade, I was on a PVP and alt-ing streak, and while my druid was a pvp powerhouse, I never ran Karazhan or The Eye or Black Temple, or Hyjal, Or Sunwell. I only stepped foot into a few of those places after the great nerf right before Wrath of the Lich King. After a three+ year hiatus, I am back to raiding progression content. With my guild, we just cleared up to Auriya in Ulduar. There have been complaints that raiding has changed for the worse, but I totally disagree.

-More classes have more viable roles in a raid environment (Remember when ALL the druid/paladin/priest/shaman T1/T2/T3 gear was itemized for healing only)?

-Less consumables needed (No more farming fire prot pots for the whole damn 40-man raid to take on Ragnaros.)

-Easier to run with 10 instead of 40 (Less time to organize, no more DKP and a greater sense of contribution to the raid)

-When you wiped in Molten Core, you got thrown all the way back to Thorium Point and getting 40 people to make a 5-minute run actually takes 10-15 minutes. Now if you wipe in Ulduar you fly right back in, repair right there, warp to the right area, and you can make another attempt with the last attempt fresh in your memory.

The sum result is raiding is much more enjoyable and accessible. We can go in, kill 2 or 3 bosses a night, get our phat lootz, and have fun in the process. It is real satisfying to wipe on the XT Deconstructor at 75%, then wipe again 50% the next time, then blow him away on our third attempt. The Iron Assembly was a hoot when our Tank ate a Fusion Punch for whatever ridiculous damage and we were all laughing seeing Steelbreaker wind up and slam him flat into the ground, rather than grumble about another wipe, or which healer wasn't dispelling (don't look at the healing druid!). Who woulda thought wiping would be fun?

Kologarn was the best example. We didn't expect to get up to Kologarn last night, and so we took him on with little preparation. We were able to glance at Wowwiki and see how his hands and abilities worked. Now, I won't claim to be a leet progression raider at the forefront of hardcore raiding, I don't see whats wrong with reading ahead of an encounter. But we got a little taste last night as the Wowwiki article has almost no tips or tricks of what to do with Kologarn.

We tried dpsing his body and dealing with his hand's abilities as they came. After a couple attempts we were getting some progress, but the crushing hand combined with the eye beams and the other hand's shockwave was too much to heal through. Also, the crushing hand ability takes one dps or healer out of combat for a long while. We then decided to dps the right hand exclusively until it shattered, which not only helps release people caught in crushing grip faster, but also destroys the hand and stops people from being crushed. With crushing problems eliminated, we were able to heal through the raid damage better. We wiped another time because the adds that spawned on shattering an arm werent being handled right. We got that part down and before I knew it, Kologarn was rubble at our feet after 5 attempts. We had come up with a strategy that suited our group best and, working together, led to the boss's defeat. Now, that is what raiding is all about.

Ulduar has also been very kind to me - I now have spiffy new bracers, belt, and boots from the last couple weeks of raiding. Progression is a good thing, in more ways than one.

When not raiding, I've been doing the ol' alt thing. Sneezeguard the priest is at level 46 now, and Thundoor the shaman clocked in to level 74. I'm going to focus on these two in my spare time.