Lethal Shots

Well, for me at least. Over the weekend I went into Ulduar with Soulbound and downed four bosses, three of which I had never downed before.

We started off by clearing out Ignis and Razorscale, neither of which I had downed before. I had seen the encounters, just never been successful. Clearing these two out completed my Siege of Ulduar achievement, which thrills me to no end. After that we went up and tore through Kologarn. I had already downed him before, so nothing new there. After that we decided to work try for the Assembly of Iron. It took a few tries, but we downed them also, completing The Antechamber of Ulduar achievement, which thrills me even more.

Overall the run was a blast. I hate the Ignis fight. I spent both tries laying dead on the floor right from the start, one because I didn’t stop firing quick enough after my MD pull and drew aggro, and the other I was pulled into the pot right off the back and died. Razorscale was fun, though a tad bit hectic. Kologarn is easy. And the Assembly of Iron was a blast. I’d have to say that it is easily my favorite encounter in the game so far. Some of the abilities used by the bosses are awesome. There is just enough movement to make it interesting without being a pain in the ass. Really, it is a well put together encounter.

Anyway, after last weekend I am now 7/14 in Ulduar. I am hoping to clear it out eventually (ok, honestly I doubt I will ever be 14/14, but 13/14 is good enough for me), but with 3.2 and a new raid instance dropping today guild focus may move forward. We’ll still be running Ulduar for gearing, but I’m not sure how far we will get progression wise. But there’s always hope.

Boy, haven’t done one of these in a while. Time to get back in the habit of them.

• Progression in Ulduar over the weekend, with two upgrades for me (can’t remember the names, armory Santyn to see them). Hours of wipes, but I can’t even begin to describe how much fun those hours were.
• Gold. I’m slowly making it, yet also spending it. The gem market is starting to die down. I think this is because many of the more hardcore players are done getting upgrades until 3.2, meaning low demand. But I have been investing in Titanium Ore to prospect. Not actively hunting it, just keeping an eye on the trade channel for good deals.
• I don’t know what I would do without Inscription. Lately, glyphs are the largest source of income for me. Well worth the gold I invested to level it.
• Naxx-25 over the weekend too. I had a blast completely decimating the meters. Personal best of 6k DPS on Loethab.
• Parenting advice for Hunters out there: when the raid wipes but you manage to live thanks to Feign Death, read a book to your kid while waiting for everyone to run back in.
• Not much alt time lately, been spending too much time doing other stuff. I’m going to have to remedy that. I really want to play some of my alts in end-game content.

Well, that’s all I have for now. Now tell me what you’re thinking.

Last night I made my first trip into Ulduar. It was a rather short run, but it was still loads of fun. The reason for the shortness of the run was group composition. While we were able to get 10-people together, we were missing tanks and healers. Lucky for us that doesn’t matter in the Flame Leviathan fight.

Since it was my first time in there I was instructed to drive one of the  Siege Engines, which I was told is one of the easier tasks. That was fine by me. Best to learn an encounter from one of the less critical seats. For the trash, my job was basically to tank. It was pretty easy. We proceeded to take out the trash and all four towers. Everything went smooth with no deaths. We did wipe however when we got to the boss. The boss was spawned before everyone was ready (or the fight even explained). We lost a few people quick, so we experimented with him some to get a litle practice and then went ahead and wiped.

Though once we came back in we proceeded to wipe him. I’m calling it a 1-shot since the first pull was not intentional. The fight reminded me a lot of the Little Red Riding Hood encounter in Kara. Hopefully later this week we will be able to go in and clear out a few more bosses.

And another week has passed us by. Got a lot on my mind this time :

• More maintenance today, with more realms getting hardware upgrades. I am retracting my previous guess of 3.1.2 today. I don’t think it will drop until all the hardware upgrades are done.
• It’s been a little slow on the raiding front for me lately, but there is a Ulduar-10 run scheduled for Wednesday. I can’t wait.
• My server went down last night. So I popped over to Ner’zhul to say hi to Amava and Matticus, then started working a DK through their starting area to kill time.
• I really miss Amava’s blog. Hopefully my small prompting will encourage him to revive it.
• I fail at scheduled weekly posting. I promise the next installment of Hunting Tactics will be out soon.
• I’ve been leveling Inscription as my DK’s second profession. So far I have gotten it up to 200. I don’t have an Herbalist, so all herbs have been coming from the AH. I’m just hoping I can at least break even by selling the junk I have to make to level it.
• I did join in on a successful guild run of VoA over the weekend, downing the new boss on the first try. Let me just say the new boss is way more fun than the old one.
• I tried leveling my Paladin, but I’m just not ready to grind through the old world again yet. So I have decided to work on my Death Knight. As of last night he is up to 63 and just started in Zangarmarsh.
• I healed a normal Gun’Drak for my friends in my alt-guild. It went great, and I think I am getting their interest primed for moving up into heroics.
• The biggest problem my friends in my alt-guild have? They under estimate themselves. These guys know their class and are solid players. With a few craftable gear upgrades and a few things from normal level 80 instances, they could be rocking heroics.
• My gem business is holding pretty steady. It’s not making me a millionaire overnight, but the income is pretty steady.

Well, that’s all I got. Now give give me your thoughts.

Another week, another mental vomit from me.

• Server upgrades and extended maintenance today? If 3.1.2 didn’t drop today, but I bet it will next week.
• More Naxx and no Ulduar over the weekend. Sure, Naxx is fun and all but I really want to see the new content. Just need to get guildies (and me) geared up more.
• I’ve been doing loads of healing on my Shaman. Several heroics, and even a Naxx-10 and OS-25.
• Graphic glitches suck, especially on movement intensive fights. Namely Sarth. It is impossible to dodge flame walls when they pop in and out of existence.
• See previous point for why I ALMOST completed OS-25 on my Shaman, after two wipes I bowed out so they could find another healer. No point in continuing if I was just going to die right away.
• I’m starting to play the AH some. Mostly trying to make money off the professions I have already dropped a ton in to level. I’ve made a little profit so far, but nothing to brag about.
• I think I have settled on my Paladin to level next. Now I just need to decide if he will be an Inscriptionist or Alchemist. Both offer potential AH profit, but Alchemy would probably be more useful to me.

Well, my mind is dry-heaving now so I better stop. What’s your mind spewing?