I stopped by Cenarion Post and picked up a brand new pretty feathered speed-bird for my srs raiding priest and then I flew off on said bird to the Coilfang reservoir and swam down the drainpipe to be ready and prepared, yes sir!, outside Serpentshrine Cavern at 2015 sharp yesterday.
I had a big picnic basket with me, 100 Sacred Candles with me, 20 charges of Superior Mana Oil, 5 Flasks of Mighty Restoration and more Golden Fish Sticks than even the most devout lover of fish'n chips could devour in a lifetime.
- Read up on tactics? Check.
- Repaired? Check.
- Bags full of mana pots? Check.
I Was Prepared.
Going to be raiding srsly two days a week now, Mondays and Wednesdays from 20.30 til whenever are now marked Do Not Disturb in my calendar, in the company of 24 more like-minded people in the Raid Core of Jools' otherwise casual Aerie Peak guild.
Yesterday was the kick-off for the Raid Core after the summer holidays, and we were going to Serpentshrine Cavern to kick the tender asses of the Lurker and Leotheras the Blind.
Was I nervous? Yes. Was I thrilled? Yes.
I had been on a Lurker kill before, after a wipeless Maggy kill followed by a successful High King Maulgar and Gruul kill, when we were all high on success and raid adrenaline and kept going to SSC and the lurking fish boss there, so I wasn't too worried about that fight.
I remembered some basic facts of SSC, like don't jump down the elevator, don't fall into the water, stay out of the green mist when the Bog giants die, and such, so the trash pulls went by pretty fast and I kept my tank alive without a fuss.
What is very important about the Lurker fight, btw? That's right, jump into the water when he takes a deep breath and stay there until he has finished spouting.
This was an ah, right-moment for me as he took his deep breath and aimed straight for me when he stared spouting. Result:
But I since wasn't the only one that kicked the bucket that fight we ressed, buffed up and fished that scaled monster out of his hidey-hole again.
What are the odds of the damned slimy boss taking that deep breath of his and immediately start spouting at the very same person (=me!) that just happens to be slightly slow jumping off the island.
Very high, it seems...
Wasn't that bad though, I had a rather good view of the fireworks from my position safely away from the action ;P
After we got our revenged and looted phat epix from the dead pile of stinking scales and fishbone, we headed onwards!
And who is to say that the guild spirit is not one for all and all for one? When one of the tanks got knocked into the water and the trash mob followed him there, he was first joined by a healer and a dps to help beat him down. After the rest of us had taken the mobs still on the platform down we all followed suit, like a flock of lemmings we threw ourselves down into the water!
Leo was a bit of a badass though, and sadly he lived to see another day while we got seriously pwned by him.
Possible reasons why we didn't kill him:
- seasoned raiders were a bit rusty and new ones were a bit unused to the chaotic havoc-wreaking and dazzling, screaming fireworks (it is very different from the 10-man raids)
- general bad luck
- and of course the general scape-goat: LAG! (although sadly I can't blame my mistakes yesterday on that because it was totally lag-free)
- hmm can't really think of any other reason...:)
But his respite won't last long, tomorrow we will take him down!!
I got an unexpected surprise as well in there, one of my friends from my old pvp server popped in on a newly created lvl 2 alt just to say hello!!
What I Learned From Yesterday's Raiding
from my own and my fellow raiders experiences and (mis-)fortunes.
1. Warlocks are handy. They will summon you back up to the platforms if you are a noob and fall into the water and an even bigger noob and can't find your way up.
2. If you die on the elevator down and your dead body goes up and down on it, don't accept a friendly ress unless the platform is at the bottom.
3. If you don't kill off your Inner Demon fast enough and end up being mind-controlled, and the raid wipes before they can kill you off, you end up being mind-controlled for the entire 10 minutes, after which you just die.
4. Don't pull more than one trash pack at a time.
5. If you rely on BigWigs or some similar boss mod to help you time your actions, do remember to enable it for the particualr raid instance you are in.
Hmm think that's all for now, folks, will undoubtedly have more words of wisdom to share after tomorrow.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Srs raiding is the shit!
Monday, June 16, 2008
To boldly go...
This day Jools moved to the Aerie Peak realm.
She spent the last weekends' mornings doing some heroics with some of her friends on Vashj, getting her Exalted with the Sha'tar, concluding with a quiet come-together around a bonfire in Elwynn Forest before she packed her bags and transferred. 
Aerie Peak is a pve realm = no more being ganked while peacefully questing!
Jools has found a new cool guild there and although all her sisters are on Vashj I think she will like it a lot in her new home. 
It's not likely that she ever will forget the fun times she had on Vashj, and if she comes even remotely close she can always watch this video made for her by one of her dearest friends! (And yes, I cried a lot of happy tears when I watched it :-)
So, this is a goodbye from Jools to everyone she knew on Vashj. May you all live long and prosper, may your days be sunny and warm, and may you all be careful what you wish for, because you might get it!
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Beware of terrorists!
It has a flashy title, Office of the Director of National Intelligence, with a .gov adress so it must be official, and it has spent a lot of RL gold (I guess) to produce a 15-page summary report on data mining.
The report outlines a few up-and-coming projects, but what I think will catch most gamers' eyes are the Reynard Project, "a seedling effort to study the emerging phenomenon of social (particularly terrorist) dynamics in virtual worlds and large-scale online games".
The data mining is defined as "a program involving pattern-based queries, searches or other analyses of 1 or more electronic databases" in order to " discover or locate a predictive pattern or anomaly indicative of terrorist and criminal activity..."
Terrorists in WoW?
Of course there are, let me introduce to you mr Ganker and his friend mr Scammer. But I guess you have already encountered them several times, in various guises.
You know any other place where it is totally legit to harass and grief other people? Didn't think so. Yeye, QQ more nuub, or whatever that kind of people say.
The relative anonymity and the lack of any real consequences really bring out the worst in so many people it seems, patterns of suspicious criminal and terrorist behaviour must be emerging all over the place.
I think the Reynard project would have had an easier time tracking decent, friendly and unselfish behavior in online games. Although it do exists, there really are a lot nice and kind people out there too, and I am really glad every time I meet one :-)
