Category Archives: World of Warcraft
200 Words – PUG Tales: Heroic Azjul-Nerub
I received the whisper, “Want to tank heroic AN?” I replied, “sure,” and accepted the group invitation for heroic Azjul-Nerub. Our group consisted of a Warlock, Druid, Death Knight, Priest, and me (Paladin). The Druid is a tank, but will DPS for this instance. The Warlock is party leader and doesn’t want to mark. We pull the first group that initiates the boss fight, and the Priest — our healer — grabs aggro and dies almost immediately. I die next and we wipe.
On the second attempt, I ask that the mobs be marked or I be made leader. The Druid is made leader, but still doesn’t mark the targets. I ask for the adds that come with the mini bosses to be crowd controlled. I’m assured that one will be shackled, and one will be rooted. I then ask if everyone is ready and the Warlock replies, “y.” I pull, and, as you can imagine, the Priest does not shackle, and the root attempt is either resisted or the mob is immune. We wipe again. The Priest then states that the group does not have the “right consistency” and leaves. We disband at this point and I go back to questing.
200 Words – Dusting Off My Plate in The Oculus
Last night, I returned to my tanking role in World of Warcraft. I had been playing alts to take advantage of the recruit-a-friend program’s experience bonus for the last couple of months so I was a bit rusty, to say the least. We ran the regular five-man dungeon The Oculus and it was like no other dungeon I had run before. Sure, there were plenty of AoE, tank-and-spank moments, but the boss fights were a nice change of pace. From the beginning, you’re given flying mounts to use inside the instance. The mounts are used for navigating through the dungeon, but also for clearing trash mobs and for fighting the last boss. We cleared the place pretty easily, and I picked up a new tanking helm: The Helm of the Ley-Guardian.
One of the many new game features introduced in Wrath of the Lich King is the ability to wear a faction tabard in level eighty instances. I wore my Kirin Tor tabard and hit honored while clearing The Oculus. This is a great change from Burning Crusade, where dungeons are faction-specific. Now, I can choose the groups I want to get friendly with, if you know what I mean.
What I'm Looking Forward to Most in the next World of Warcraft Expansion: Wrath of the Lich King
News about the next expansion to World of Warcraft (titled “Wrath of the Lich King”) broke last night: Details on Death Knights, videos of the new zones, and the continuation of the token reward system. One particular item has my appetite for the expansion completely wet though: all raids in the expansion will be tuned and made available to both groups of 10 and 25 players. Worldofwar.net reported about this after their presentation at Blizzard headquarters with Blizzard’s Jeff Kaplan:
At this point, Kaplan revealed the massive news that Blizzard are changing the way raids are done in Northrend, and making them similar to the 5 man instances, whereby they can be played on two levels of difficulty. All 25 man raids will also be available as 10 man raids. The loot tables will be completely different, the 25 man raids will have better and/or more loot, but this means that most players will get to see the end game content in the 10 man version, if not the 25 man one. He went on to explain the reasons behind this; Karazhan, the 10 man instance in the Burning Crusade, was the most popular instance in the game by far. The 10 man dungeons are obviously popular due to the fewer amount of players needed, and the easier difficulty level. Secondly, a lot of 25 man raiding guilds did not like to have to go through the 10 man raids to get access to the 25 man raids. This new system should please everybody (but I’m certain there will be the usual QQers!). Another interesting fact is that the 10 man raids and the 25 man raids will be on totally separate cool downs. This means that once a guild has completed the 25 man Naxxramas for example, they could go back and complete the 10 man version of it on the same day if they wish.
Hearing this has totally enhanced my anticipation for the expansion! How cool will it be to be able to experience all the game has to offer with groups of 5 (quests/dungeons/heroics) and 10 people (raids)? I’ve been reading about the arguments for “epic” raids, where certain bosses (like the Lich King) shouldn’t be made available for only 10 people. My thoughts are just the opposite: defeating a boss or completing a difficult quest chain with a smaller group feels more epic to me.
In a group of 25 (or think back to 40-person groups), your role and class is one of many. There are typically 2-4 tanks, 5-6 healers, many DPSers, etc. Yes, what you are attempting to defeat has a higher number of HPs, but it doesn’t feel more difficult or epic than a challenging objective with fewer people.
I’m so excited after reading this! It’s a great solution that caters to people that want to group up in large numbers or small. Great job, Blizzard! 
