The things people notice...

So, I had an odd experience in the workplace today.

I'm sitting, working on my laptop, running simulators, and doing 8 different things at once... but every time I have to go enter data on the laptop my hands fall to the traditional 'right hand on mouse, left hand over wasd' where I keep my hands while I play.

My boss walks by, chuckles, and then asks what game I play.

Sometimes, its the little things people notice.

Arena, 3v3's

PvPing as SL/SL:

Holy cow, its like I'm a tank. Seriously. I've been running 3-man arena's with a Frost Mage/Holy Paladin two nights every two weeks (that way we only have to respec back and forth once - run on Monday & Tuesday night). We've been running for about a month, and after the initial drop to about 1300, we've gotten progressively better. We broke 1400 again this past week, and I'm feeling good about our chances to keep moving up in the world.

Now, our gear has gotten a little bit better, and thats made us better pvpers, but, what's made us handle fights better and deal with the quick hectic scrum that is Arena's is simply better communication.

I let our Mage call out the burn target (and his sheep target, so I don't dot it) then, we collectively hope that they try to kill the warlock. Why? Because I can take one heck of a beating. Seriously. It helps that we have the uber paladin healer to keep us alive.

My job in the arena's? Fear like crazy, dots on everything (unless the Mage calls a sheep target), and just run around in circles while trying to stay inside healing range of the paladin.

I'm not a great pvp-er, I'll admit that. I'm decent. I can hold my own vs most people 1vs1. I'm not aware enough, nor do I have enough macro's to properly use my felhunter. I haven't found a use for any of the other pets yet (I've thought about trying a succubus and having her seduce... but she dies SO quickly its not worth it).

So, I'm coming to you, my faithful readers, for pvp advice, blogs to read, addons you may suggest....

I just spent badges on a set of pvp boots, as there are no more badge upgrades for Abs on the PvE side. I got the Arena chest and the 8000 honor trinket, now I'm down to the two pvp blues to replace. I decided to go with two pieces of Dreadweave and two pieces of Felweave to get the 70 resil bonus instead of the -0.2 sec off of Fear.

Anyway, enough ramblings.... FEEDBACK! Please!

Gruul Down... Mags next.

KoU led its first run into Gruuls. We one shotted High King and Gruul and went onto Mags. We got him to 31% when a missed click wiped the raid.

Stupid clickers.

We'll get him next week... I hope ;)

Gnometastic's Tips to Leading a Raid

Now, I have much more experience leading 10 man raids than I do leading 25 mans. I am not sure where this post will go, but... here goes nothing.

I led my first 25 man run on Wednesday. We defeated High King and we took down Gruul without incident (well, okay, we almost wiped on Gruul but he died, so it counts!).
My guildmates performed amazingly as always, and they made rule number one easy to follow.

Rule 1) Don't be afraid to tell people to shut up on Vent/Teamspeak. You're the raid leader, you need to give instructions, healing assignments, misdirect assignments... Chatty Kathy needs to be able to be quiet for 10 minutes and listen so that people who haven't been there or people who don't know their own specific assignments.

Rule 2) Trash pulls must go quickly.
Everyone doesn't need 5 paladin buffs to kill trash. You don't need everyone at full mana. Some pulls, maybe so, TK Pulls for example, are not very forgiving (the 5 pulls near Void Reaver for example), but still, keep moving, don't wait, explain the next pull while people mana up and rez the dead.

Rule 3) Don't be afraid to tell people if they are messing up. Its your raid, but its not just your time. You're taking 50 hours of peoples time for a 2 hour raid. Don't let one screw up mess it up for everyone by doing stupid crap. Tell them what they're doing wrong. If they refuse to listen or have the "lolz I knowz better den youz" attitude, kick them.

Rule 4) Required addons, chat programs. Everyone. And I mean everyone has to have Omen. Paladins should have Pally Power. Everyone must have Ventrilo. An easy way to check if people are paying attention and/or in vent is to simply say "If you can hear me say this, please, click NO." and do a /readycheck

Rule 5) Stay positive. Tell people when they've done well. Wipes will happen, just don't let them frustrate you too much... the first two times at least. That 4th wipe on Shade always sucks....

Thats it. 5 easy rules. What did I miss?

Loving my guild...

Well, as of last night, Knights of Utopia has made it to 4/6 in Zul'Aman.

We took down Jan'Alai for the first time, with everyone managing to avoid the firey balls of doom we downed him.

Our strategy was brought to us by Owaru, who tanked 8.7 million birds at once on each side so we cleared all of them in 2 spawns of the trolls, while I tanked Jan'alai on the other platform.

A week earlier we downed Halazzi. That puts us at 4/6 in ZA.

4 months ago our guild changed leadership, and had the core raiding crew gutted.

Since then, its been nothing but successes for us. I'm glad to be a part of my guild, and glad to be a raid leader. We have fun, we joke around, we do things we shouldn't be able to do.

A guild that hasn't even touched Gruul's or Mag's as a whole shouldn't be 4/6 in ZA.

So, although this is just a fluff post. I'm happy. I'm proud. I'm loving it.

Also, we're hitting Gruul's for the first time in 10 days. Wednesday the 10th. Who wants in? :)