Monday, June 10, 2013

Monday Random Thoughts

- Read a post over Taitrina's Blog, Still Searching, about marvel heroes this weekend so I figured I would give it a try.

- I've give a quick review.

- If you like Diablo 3 odds are you will like this.

- It is well made for a free to play, better than most free to play games.

- They do not shove buying things in your face either.

- But you need bag space because I am already out of it and it seems the only way to get more bag space is by buying it.

- I was willing to buy a few more slots.

- Every time I play one of those free to play games that I think I might actually spend a little time on I do not mind spending some money on bag space.

- It is the only thing worth buying in my opinion.

- That is a hint blizzard.

- I, and many like me, would gladly pay for more space if it is reasonable.

- The problem with marvel heroes is that they do not accept paypal.

- That is how I pay for these things online, it is the most secure way.

- They don't accept discover either and I can't understand that one, it is a major credit card.

- Either way, I don't think I will end up playing all that long.

- Not if I can not get bag space otherwise.

- They won't let me buy it with paypal so there better be a way to get it in game or I am gone.

- Being out of bag space is stressful.

- Shifting stuff around like crazy and trying to find space is not exactly what I call fun.

- Even if I will willing to pay for more they don't want to sell it to me apparently.

- How do you release a game online and not have one of the top payment method included?

- I might write a proper review later but that is it for now.

- Over all a good game I might have considered playing more if only there were more bag space.

- Or a way to contact them to complain about the lack of paypal as a payment option.

- But I could not find a way to contact anyone in game or on their site.

- Apparently they do not want people contacting them either.

- They do not want people buying stuff, thanks to lack of options, and they do not want people contacting them.

- Yeah, this is off to a great start.

- Good game, bad handling, would have played it if I could have had more bag space.

- They lost their window of opportunity to sell me on the game.

- If bag space were not an issue I would say for sure I would play again.

- As it is now, I probably won't.

- Now back to warcraft.

- As you can guess, I was playing something else this weekend so not much wow stuff going on.

- The buzz around the guild is mostly great for the flex raiding.

- It seems to have everyone excited about the game again.

- Even reached out to a few people that quit and they are considering coming back.

- An easier raid, pug possibilities, less need for a required schedule to raid, they like the idea.

- Maybe blizzard made a step in the right direction, lets hope it turns out as good as it sounds.

- Maybe they will realize that the majority of their player base does not want challenging content.

- Easier sells.  Heroics are for challenging content.

- There was no reason for normal mode to have ever been of any real difficulty.

- There should have been no need for LFR or for Flex mode.

- Normals should have been LFR difficulty, so it could be easily pugged, and heroics should have been for the challenge.

- Blizzard just always takes the long route around things instead of fixing them.

- Lets see, fix it or design two new levels of raiding.

- Lets design two new levels of raiding.

- Yeah, who is running that place, really.

- I like challenge but sadly there are not enough people capable of handling it any more.

- So I have reached a stage in my gaming life where I either have to switch servers and find a new guild if I want to do challenging or adjust to the skill level of the players on my server.

- My days of normal modes being a fun challenge are long behind me.

- Now they are pull out your hair difficult.

- There is only so much one person can do.  Raiding is a team sport and unless everyone is playing at a top level you don't move anywhere.

- So the game needed easier normal modes.

- And that flex mode idea, that is awesome.

- I think this is a test and if it goes over well next expansion there will be no such thing and 10 man and 25 man.  It will just be called raiding.

- And then we will see the truth I have always talked about.

- If 10 and 25 do not exist we will see which modes are really easier.

- If all those heroic guilds are going with big groups they would be going with those big groups for a reason, because it is easier.

- That is the basis of my argument why most heroic guilds are 25 man guilds.

- People will always take the path of least resistance.

- 25 is easier, so they go 25.

- Simple human nature really.

- The real fun part is how they will manage each fight on a fight to fight basis.

- Will going with 17 on one fight make it easier, then sit 8.

- Will going with no melee make a fight easier, so sit the melee.

- Or ranged on this fight have a hard time, give them the night off.

- World first guilds will surely find ways to tweak the fights to best work for them.

- Even something as simple as only going with 23 for a specific fight might lower it to be easier than if you had the full 25, so they might sit two people just to get the first kill.

- Can you imagine how strategy guides would be?

- Now it is "this fight requires 2 tanks 2-3 healers 5-6 DPS" to "this fight is most favorable if you use a make up of "2 tanks, 3 healers, 2 melee and 6 ranged."

- Maybe things like that are a reason flex will never come to real raiding.

- It makes it more complex.

- But I would love to see the world first race like that.

- All the best guilds tinkering with the lineups to try and find the best angle to win and with how many of each.

- It would add a level of complexity to the game that has never been seen before.

- At least until someone cracks the code on how the number of people in the raid effects it.

- Then the theory crafters will get to work and give us a definitive answer of how many it is best to do any given fight with.

- Have you ever noticed that female goblin death knights have to be the most evil looking class / race combination in the game.

- In my opinion at least, what is yours?

- I saw one and said, I think I know that girl.

- Then a chill went up my spine and I thought, I think I dated her.

- Yes, that evil.

- I love the way male pandas die.

- It is like they are such bad actors.

- If William Shatner and his amazing acting skills were ever put in game they are the male pandas death animation for sure.

- And how they sit to eat is funny too.

- They do not sit, they plop.

- They might even rival the Gnomes for the comic relief in the game when it comes to things like eating and death at least.

- Lay down and then get up again and think, if getting up is that much trouble for a male panda, how the hell does he fight?

- Went through some of the older LFRs on my monk again this weekend to try and catch up on the sigils.

- It seems they really upped the drop rate, which is nice, because lets face it, it is not fun to run old content over and over for months on end when there is nothing you need from it except a quest item.

- Problem is they might drop more but are still not balanced.

- Poor monk has 7 power and 27 wisdom.

- I will gladly trade 17 wisdom for 3 power.

- How about they just update it to needing 20 sigils, of any combination?

- Now that would have been a good update.

- At least we got an increased drop rate.  Better than nothing.

- It seems like every hunter I know has the 2 522 tier pieces from nalak.

- Everyone but me of course.

- I really think I am going to give up this expansion on trying to be an effective damage dealer.

- Gear means too much to a damage dealer and getting none means you are behind the ball.

- It would be to no fault of my own.

- I run what I can, I use all my coins, I just do not get loot.

- Nothing I can really do if I do not have the items right?

- I might just go tank full time.

- While gear still helps you do your job better at the end of the day if you beat a fight you beat a fight, no one care how well the tank beat the fight.

- But when we go in and I am dead last in DPS it sucks.

- Last week on the first boss I was the only one under 200K.  It really sucks to be low man on the totem pole when it is to no fault of my own.

- I can't get the numbers without the gear.

- I want to see a change to the game.

- I want skill to be more important than gear again.

- In my gear my best, absolute best, on the first boss was 189K.

- Sad, isn't it.

- All I want is equal gear, so I can claim my top spot again.

- I'm a hunter damn it, it is my job to be #1.

- Anything less is failure.

- # 1 DPS, #1 Damage Done and dead last Damage taken.  If you do that, you did your job right.

- Of our 5 damage dealers in our main group, 2 have 2 522 tier pieces, 2 have 3 522 tier pieces, I have none.

- Of the 5 damage dealers in our main group, I am the only one with a 502 weapon, one even has a thunderforged weapon.

- See, not my fault I am last.

- I just do not like being last.

- I like when even if I have less gear I can make up for it by doing my job better.

- Not going to happen with this expansion, gear matters to much.

- Not to mention the damage dealers in my group are all very good.

- We just need better healing and consistent tanks and we would be doing heroics by now.

- How many casual guilds do you know that can field a team of damage dealers all capable of 120K+ on unbuffed fights that still know how to do mechanics, kick turtles, etc, and keep up those numbers?

- I've done a few pugs on my server and see people in the top guild on my server not even come close.

- Did a 25 pug last week or last tier stuff and 1-5 were my crew, 6, 3% behind on damage done, was from the #1 guild on the server.

- Yeah, that felt nice.

- If only we had the other pieces we would be stuck in heroics and not stuck in normals.

- Our healers are good, but not great, and that is what is really getting us.

- Sadly there are no healer recruits on my server.

- And the one available one that is great and out there I had a falling out with some years back because I asked him to raid heal and he wanted to tank heal.

- He was a druid.

- I said, I am not saying you can not tank heal, I am saying I want you on the raid and let the paladin tank heal.  You are a better raid healer than a paladin would be.

- He quit the guild because I hate druid healers.

- Yeap, I hate druid healers because I put him on raiding healing.

- Some people really need to stop smoking the funky flowers.

- In a group with a paladin healer who would assign the druid as the tank healer?  Not me at least.

- Have to go farm my materials in the barrens today to get ready for tomorrow.

- Love starting the week with 200 valor as soon as I log in.

- That and with a crew for heroic scenarios were we always get the timer and it is cap in less than 2 hours.

- I just hope I can keep this team wanting to play every tuesday.

- I can see them getting tired already with the things.

- At least they are fast and only blood in the snow is really annoying.

- That is also the only one that takes more than 10 minutes I think.

- I still need to run the last 2 LFRs for titan runstones even if capped already.

- I know I should do them to get to cap, but I like getting to cap first.

- It allows me the freedom to play on any character I want without feeling like I am losing something because I don't have the valor of the ancients buff.

- So if I switch full time to tanking what would you suggest, druid, death knight or monk?

- Both shield tanks are still sitting in stormwind.

- I've had no desire to level them.

- Druid is the one I am best at, in my opinion.

- Either way, there are decisions to be made, because without gear I am not going to be able to keep up as a damage dealer.

- At least switching to tank as my focus and not just as a fill in would mean we always have a dedicated tank for the raids.

- Have a great day.

28 comments:

  1. I didn't know you read my blog, I'm honored. I hadn't tried to buy anything so I didn't know about the limited payment options. Everything to buy seems so expensive so I'm not going there. So far Marvel Heroes seems ok enough, the more I play the more things I run into that I think could be better, or I don't like. However, I'm still planning to finish the story. Whether I play it after that I don't know. The levelling system after the story ends is really broken apparently, couple that with the most rng of rng, and I suspect it won't be something I'll boot too often. Still with the Marvel backdrop it's more fun than Diablo which I played about once I think. I would like to play as different heroes but the cost seems extreme. Only other way to get a different one is as a drop. The droprate is the most random you can imagine. They have the same chance to drop off any mob in game (bosses might be higher) and that's any hero off any mob. So I could get Storm which I'm already playing as. There's no real way to grind them short of just mowing down your preferred mobs, no guarantee one will ever drop. Which makes the only option the overpriced store. I appreciate that they have to make money but how they think they'll retain players I don't know. Anyway, I've got another post about this in the works. I'll post it when I'm done with the story.

    Wow your guild dps is a lot better than ours. Only our ret pally reaches that sort of number on the first boss. The gap between him and the others is embarrassing sometimes and not just on that boss. Some of our dps average 80k which is kinda low at this point in the tier I would have thought. Your dps is still a lot better than most, the people in your guild must be exceptional and gear does make too big a difference. I got stuck on Battletron in Brawlers. I had a 489 weapon, I got a 516 scenario drop. With the 489 weapon I had to use potions, flasks, food and do everything perfect and I got to maybe 8% before beserk. With the 516 weapon I did it first time even though I screwed up a bit, did 25k more dps with mistakes. That is just wrong.

    Well if I'm going to recommend a tank it would ofc be paladin. With that not being an option I'm not sure. We have four tanks in my guild now, me and three death knights. Another tank we used to have was a warrior so no help there. The only other tank type I've raided with this expansion was a monk, both times I thought they were pretty useless, whether that's a reflection on the class or the player I couldn't tell you. I certainly feel a lot squishier on my monk than on my paladin. So with that background I'd recommend DK I think. My friend, and favourite tanking partner, swears by it. Besides with how OP paladins have been in Throne we're bound to get a heavy nerfbat. So while I'll stick with it through thick and thin as I love the class, there's no point in levelling it special only to have a heavily nerfed class.

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    1. Yes I do. I get around reading a lot. I guess I could make an effort to comment more but as I have said before, I am not a very social type person. lol I reply here because I should. Everyone that has a blog should reply to the people that take the time to voice their opinion. It is only right in my opinion.

      I would like to play on other characters too but being you have no quests on them it make leveling them harder which sucks and they share even the same main bag, not just the bank which should be shared loot. I've found some issues too. I would have gladly purchased more space to hold stuff, that is for sure but other than that I do not see anything I would spend money on.

      You have to see our DPS burst. It is sick seeing 5 people all over 400K sometimes if the stars line up right. One of them is routinely over 400K on burst and I have seen him go up to 600K on rare occasion. On tortos our melee does over 300K. Yes, the DPS are skilled. Now if we had healers of that same skill level we would be in great shape. Even avoiding the avoidable we always ed up dying because the healers can't keep up. At least with our DPS it allows us to three heal. Sadly most of the time they can still not get it done.

      I could get my paladin to 90 and gear by this weekend. That is not a problem. But our one main tank that is dependable is a paladin who I have solo tanking half the bosses already. lol We do not need another.

      Okay, I will chalk this up for one vote DK.

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    2. No quests on them? This I have to google. Oh ok yeah you're right. You can reset the whole deal but progress is account wide rather than character. That sucks. They obviously intend the characters to be separate otherwise they would all be the same level as whatever your max level is, so why isn't the quests separate too? Chalk up another error on their part.

      That is sick dps, I know who to call when things just have to die hehe. Ah I didn't know you already had a paladin, doesn't make a lot of sense to have two then. Well I suppose that would depend. It would be better to have two paladins rather than have two of any other tank class right now I'd imagine. My healers complain that two of our three DK's are hard to heal, one of them they moan bitterly is a mana pump, but he's new so I'm trying to cut him a bit of slack. Nothing beats paladin self healing and mitigation right now I believe. On a pure class basis (not because I'm a control freak - much *whistles*) I always take the harder assignments as it's just easier for the healers to keep me up. Like On Dorumu, if a DK tanks him during beam phase it sucks mana from healers, if I do it then a HoT plus beacon and I'm fine. Paladins are definitely overpowered right now. Now the strength of a paladin does go up in proportion to how much vengeance we have. I survived a breath on Tortos which killed the raid, I then soloed the last 3 million down. I don't think any other class could do that. We are stupidly powerful right now. I like it but I know it won't last. Anyway, having two paladin tanks would be of benefit for extra Devotion Aura, for all the sheer mitigation you can throw out, for the extra raid healing (which isn't much but can't be sniffed at). I mean with our Shield of Righteous we have what amounts to a cd, for any other class, every few seconds. So don't feel that you have to or should pick another class for the sake of variety.

      I also wasn't fishing for comments. I was genuinely surprised and flattered. You are my favourite blogger, I check your blog everyday for new posts, so I am pretty honored that you'd spend any of your time looking at my little musings.

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    3. Yeah, a bit of double thinking there. They need to either make all heroes one level or give each hero their own leveling experience. Without the quest line you are off on your own grinding for experience. I don't see that going over all that well for casual alt type players.

      Our paladin, from the outside looking in, might not seem like a great player. It takes him a lot longer to learn things than most but once he has it, he remembers it and nails it. I am willing to invest a few extra wipes while he learns. Goes back to that saying, I would rather play with people I enjoy playing with. It is also the reason why we have not replaced two of the healers in our rotation.

      I survive the breath on my bear nearly every time. Don't last long after it however. Funny bear story. Did throne of the four winds heroic for an achievement run and the raid wiped at 50%. Forgot to tell them about the lighting thing, oops. My fault. I soloed the last 50 percent by myself on my bear. Now if only I could do that on a current raid.

      Thanks for the kind words. We are all just bloggers in the big old universe of the internet. Both in the same boat, posting a few things that interest us and if people read them they do and if they don't that is fine too. Quite honestly I never expected anyone to ever find this blog or respond on it. I did it as something for me. I am glad you like it.

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  2. I'd suggest giving monk tanking a try since you've already spent time on the other two. Once you've gotten your feet wet, make the decision at that point. Any more specific advice would be heavily tainted by my own opinion (DK > monk > druid > pally > warrior). Even though I put DK first I'd probably run a monk due to the shared gear thing with the dps spec, DK tank gear isn't as good for dps (or DK dps gear isn't as good for tanking, depending on how you're gearing up). I'd probably only focus on a DK tank if it was going to be my main raiding toon for a while where focusing on a spec is more of a requirement than a preference and missing out on simultaneous dps gear upgrades won't feel like a missed opportunity every time it happens.

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    1. Yeah, I would need actual practice monk tanking. The few times I did it I felt as if I was stuck with nothing to use. I hate that feeling. And I was not over cleansing either, which someone suggested might be the reason. Just don't know why I feel gaping holes in how they tank. I keep thinking I missed something no matter how many times I have read every guide I can get my hands on.

      Good point on the monk. I can even roll with the same enchants. I do tank on my DK in DPS gear, but my DK has yet to tank a raid this expansion so I might need to change that.

      I'll put this as two votes DK.

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    2. The trick for monk tanks is that Tiger Palm is free when you're tanking... no resource cost at all. If you have nothing to push, push that. That's probably what you're missing, otherwise you're just running with a very low level of haste, my monk runs at about 7K and the rotation feels pretty smooth, I probably hit an extra TP every 15 seconds or so.

      Yeah, you can tank in dps gear on a DK and generally higher-iLvl dps gear will be better than lower-iLvl tank gear but it's still sub-optimal. Choosing which spec to get loot in actually matters in terms of the gear that drops. With monks, it doesn't, aside from tier off the world bosses.

      But yes, if you're leaning toward the DK anyway, go for it. Ever since an Arms warrior stole my druid's Agi polearm in H ToC (it was BiS for him due to massive ArP, but STILL) I'm all for a tank class rolling on dps warrior weapons and the pissier they get about it, the better. Go get 'em. :)

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    3. It has a 500 item level, not sure what the haste is offhand. I think it is around 6K now. I find myself spamming tiger palm because that is all I have to do.

      Hey, a 2 handed sword is just as good for a DK tank as it is for a warrior. He has no right to complain.

      Was like in the old days when I would roll on a strength item with my druid and someone would say, druids don't need strength. I would say, but I do need dodge and show me one agility neck with dodge on it and you can have this strength piece. Nice that they smoothed that out some now.

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    4. "Has no right to complain" != "Won't complain" :) Drink in the warrior tears for me!

      Ahem.

      I will say, though, that I'd generally prioritize weapons for dps since they'll get more benefit out of the slot. They'd have to prioritize tier tokens for the tanks to compensate, though, since tank bonuses are generally pretty good. Seems fair.

      Monk-wise... I'm honestly not even sure what my basic rotation is but I think it's something like KS, BoK, Jab, TP, Jab, PB, repeat. I'd think 6K haste could support that rotation, more or less, and it should have just enough slack time that you can weave in other abilities occasoinally as required or toss in a few extra TP.

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    5. I would normally do the same when it comes to weapons. But certain things can swing both ways. Not as much any more, but back then, yes. The only time I would have ever complained is if a rogue got my bow. It does nothing for them and everything for me. At least the DK and the warrior have all their damage based on the same piece.

      I played with it a bit. Need to get a rhythm going with it. Maybe this weekend.

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    6. Yeah, and hunters stealing my druid's polearm... just a stat stick for them, indirect dps boost. I'm glad that issue has mostly gone away by now, it's hard to talk someone out of wanting their BiS item even when it's really only a small actual upgrade for them vs a huge one for you.

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    7. You mean MY polearm? ;)

      There was an actually issue there however. Sure it meant more to a feral druid DPS wise but it was not "just" a stat stick for hunters. It was a huge increase to DPS because of the amount of stats on it. That made them a viable option to roll on it. If it had smaller stats, like a relic, it would make more sense to pass like a rogue would for a bow. But not as was. When the largest majority of your agility, which everything was based on, comes from the polearm, hunters needed it.

      I am glad they remove it. Less gear drama there. I just wish as a hunter I could still leave a melee weapon equip while having my bow, even if it was for appearance only.

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  3. Hi thanks for blog I am new to the game about 6 months and I love my hunter I just recently made my guilds 10 man normal raid team anyways just wanted to say I totally agree with you on the loot system I have watched the other hunter on my team get every tier set,weapon,trinket etc as I get nothing week after week so I have taken to maxing my valor to get 522 pieces slower yes but at least getting geared
    As for the tank question no idea there lol I am still learning good luck :)

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    1. Congrats on making the team.

      You are doing what you can do so that is important. Get every valor piece you can, do the LFR to offset them. We can not beat the RNG but we can do the best we can to be the best we can even if it is against us.

      If your raid leader is a good raid leader he/she will notice that your performance compared to the others is a gear thing and nothing more. Just always try to do the best you can so when you do get the better gear you will see the maximum benefit from it.

      Good luck and may the RNG shine on you.

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  4. The idea of min maxing raids sounds like a new and hellish punishment. I'm truly glad that they are sticking to the line that raids like that would be bad for the game. (Shudder)Your guild sounds like the target audience for flexible honestly.

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    1. Exactly the target audience. While we should be done with normals and stuck in heroics we are stuck in normals. With that we will blow through flex and being stuck half way through normals would be no big deal. Still a bid deal actually, but at least not as bad. Perhaps with the flex those healers would get some more gear and more practice to make them better. Two things the LFR does not supply.

      Our damage done eclipses most heroic guilds kills on WoL, on some fights by a huge margin, but our healers are dreadful when comparing them. Looking at some of the heals on those fights one healer is doing the same about all three of ours does combined. That is the weak link and flex raiding can help us there.

      Heroics should be hellish don't you think? But you mean balancing don't you? Balancing around every possible number of characters to not leave one option too hard or one too easy would be near impossible. While I would like to see it happening for the real raids I think they are still a bit away from that. I do believe it can be done however.

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    2. It's funny, my group is having similar results to yours. Our dps is doing relatively well (I'm now ranked on 2 of the 4 bosses we've killed and in our last run a guy ranked on his alt) but our healers are WAY below ranking levels... 30% or so of the ranking numbers. I know hps isn't everything but 30-40K hps seems low for what the current fights require. Since I haven't healed ToT, though, I'm not sure whether that's an issue or not.

      I also sympathize with the damage done thing, I ranked on Horridon this week but probably only because we almost missed the enrage timer so I got a huge amount of time on him with +200% damage... my damage done on that fight was significantly above anyone ranked higher than me (and only 1 was higher in the rankings below mine, and I'm guessing that guy just stayed on Horridon the whole fight).

      GC specifically made the comment that flex isn't meant for successful normal raid groups, it's meant for those who are stuck on Horridon. It was pretty much a perfect comment... but of couse he got slammed for it. I don't envy that guy.

      He also mentioned that flex won't be easy... but it's expected to allow the Horridon strugglers to down a boss a week. Sounds good to me, that's the level of difficulty I'd want for it.

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    3. He does have a hard job. I slam him all the time myself because quite frankly he deserves it. Oft times he seems to make comments that shows he does not understand the plight of the average guild. And lets be clear what I mean by that. The average guild is the type of guild it took 4-8 weeks to down horridon. Mine was 4 itself. Heck, might have even been longer and I blocked that nightmare out. But if flex is easier in that sense, it is worth it. Also, if flex means we can bring an extra healer and go with 11 and down it because of the lesser heals, it is great. I would bet if we were allowed an extra healer to help with dispels on horridon we would have had it on week 1, not week 4. That was always our issue until we mastered hitting the right targets and doing the dance right. We could have done the dance sooner, but we are not a heroic guild and that is what it comes down to. Just my opinion of course. Like I said, I agree that GC nailed it with that comment. It is for those groups.

      I have tried my hand at healing this expansion but have not really done any. My thing is they require way to much movement. That is what is making it harder on the healers. Healing takes time and it becomes be hit or heal and maybe they are making the wrong decision. I do not envy being a healer in todays 100% movement all the time fights. It is like they are saying roll a druid or you are doing it wrong. Poor healers. Stack up fights my healers will rank on, movement fights they are in that 30%-40% range. And sadly I think I am scaring them away because I am always telling them, in a polite way, that they need to step it up. It seems most fights come down to that. Heals get better or we wipe.

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  5. I've been trying to spark conversation about Flex raiding in guild but no luck. It really seems that my guild is dead on the weekends which is when I have time to play...

    Saw some podcast discussions about it though. Can definitely see a difference in opinions depending on how their in-game situation is. Have a full raid roster and they tend to say things like: "flex sucks", "those people don't deserve to raid", "combine the lockout with LFR". Having trouble filling a roster or progressing and they tend to say things like: "flex sounds awesome", "we can bring everyone and won't have to sit people out", "we can easily pug if we're under 10", "we don't have to cancel the raid if we've only got 18 people", "it'll be great for alt runs", etc.

    Got quite annoyed on one of the podcasts because one host got very elitist about it... anyway...

    I finally got 2 Titan Runestones this week (after 4 weeks I think...) and starting Tuesday we have a guaranteed drop off Lei Shen, so that's looking better. Still going to take a while.

    I'm running out of gear to upgrade... 7 upgrades left... that's 1750 vp, so in 2 weeks, I'll have no use for vp unless I start doing real raids and get more 522 pieces... Haven't been doing Heroic scenarios and haven't really looked to see if I can get any upgrades from there. Not sure how the random stats w/o sockets compares to LFR pieces. Only potential upgrades would be boots and weapon. For all other pieces that would drop in scenarios, I have tier or 522. That reminds me. Maybe I should just buy the 522 LW boots or see if a guildie can make them. Rather give the gold to a guildie.

    Went and looked on AskMrRobot. I guess the 516 weapons are OK as long as you get decent random stats.

    I've won the gun off Iron Qon 3 times in LFR now... I've killed him 6 times in the last two weeks trying to get the tier shoulders, but no luck. battle.net says I have 12 kills total. It's really annoying. I want to replace my 483 shoulders with 502 tier so I can use the 522 normal chest I have in the bank instead of the 502 tier chest... Last resort can always be the 522 SPA exalted shoulders (still need a little over 2000 rep).

    Had an LFR group that wiped on Lei Shen twice at really low percentages: <1% first time and then 8% the 2nd. Couldn't believe they did worse after the 5% determination buff. Tanks were dragging the boss all over the place during the last phase and that really messed things up. As Grumpy has said before, LFR can't be done with sub-par tanks...

    Speaking of tanks, I don't have any suggestions for Grumpy. I've only pet tanked (during Cata) and barely Blood DK tanked, so can't really give any valid advice. Pet tanking really got the short end of the stick with the 5.0 changes, but that's a different discussion.

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    1. The 522 boots are worth it. If I remember correctly they are near best in slot for a hunter outside of heroic. I got them already myself. Worth it if you can afford it in my opinion.

      I've seen what you are talking about on the forums with the elite attitude. As if other people should not be allowed to play if they can not play at your standard.

      I could see if they were nerfing heroics to the point where your average LFR skilled player could do them. They would have 100% right to complain about that. But to have something added that does not effect your game in any way and complain makes no sense. People just want to be special snowflakes, so to speak.

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  6. If you have to choose off those 3, monk. This tier hasn't been all that kind to DKs and druids and monks are really fun and versatile.

    None of the tanks are bad but if you want utility, DK brings nothing to the raid and druids - only situational. I can think of two fights where DKs have an advantage (Jin and Dark Animus) and one for druid (Council). Well... a DK can grasp some lightning balls on Lei Shen, freeze adds on Megaera, army door 3 on Horridon, but that utility is not inherent to tank, but to all DKs.

    However... this is this tier. What I always say is - choose what you like and feel most comfortable on.

    From a raider pov though... you have to see what your team lacks the most. Utility, tank's dps, tank's survival...

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    1. I tried playing around with my monk a little last night. I need to find a comfortable set up for my binds. I kept having to look at the key and click them because I do not have the memory muscle built up for it yet. I keep moving binding around too as I do things just to get a better flow going.

      I have not tanked actual content yet. Just dragging things out in the world around and playing with them. I went to some areas with elite mobs and collected up 5 or 6 of them and saw how well I could survive. Did some soloing the rares on the island. Things like that, just to get a feel for it but none of those were an actual challenge to survival. I was never in danger. But it did give me a chance to practice my binds. I grabbed goda, the dino and the elite with his pack of mobs at the same time and practiced with them. It was actually pretty fun and a little hectic, like I said I am not sure where I bound everything yet, but I killed them all and was never in danger. So even if monks feel like they do not have many cooldowns they seem to survive just fine. Not sure how however. I would like to figure that out. lol But I was living and at full health at all times.

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    2. Try soloing on the Isle of Giants. It's not a paladin only trick as I don't reset the stacks (even though I could do) so it's just a tank survival test. Right now without any assistance from anybody I can pull three little direhorns and a big direhorn without any trouble. I can also pull three little devilsaurs at once. However, I need to take the big devilsaurs on their own.

      My DK tank friend has trouble with this but even if you have to pull less, or die towards the end it's good practice in cd usage and timing. Then you also have a benchmark of "I can take two" or "I got them to 40%" and then you can try and do better next time.

      Might be an idea for a practice spot anyway :)

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    3. That sounds like a great practice spot. I am still bone farming on my hunter so I would hate getting bones on another character when I need them on my hunter. So I will wait.

      I have to remember that one. Not sure what a monk could do, it really doesn't have any cooldowns. From what I see monks are all about management more than anything else.

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    4. If you weren't aware, Expel Harm becomes spammable when you're <35% (I think) health... it's not FREE (you still have energy constraints) but it ups your self-healing significantly when you need it most when soloing... it should also hit a lot harder than Jab, so bonus dps. Just don't forget to keep Shuffle up and to remove Stagger periodically as well, even during panic times you have to keep up with the standard rotation or you turn yourself into a slightly sturdier rogue tank. :)

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    5. I did not know that. Thanks for the tip. You learn something new every day.

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  7. Was just going through the latest patch notes. Stampede is apparently useless now because they think it's OP in PvP (if it is, then disable it in arenas... stop messing up one style of gameplay to try and balance the other):

    "Hunter Pets summoned by Stampede now only use auto-attacks against their target."

    So Stampede is just a flavor ability now. "Ooh, look 5 pets! They just nip at your ankles though so don't worry about them." It has no meaningful usage if the pets don't use any of their special abilities.

    Getting a stable to cover different buffs is now useless. This was useful in Brawlers or while soloing or during certain other PvE encounters, especially if your group was missing buffs or debuffs.

    Using stampede as a survivability CD if your main pet dies is now less useful. The spawned pets won't cast Growl to taunt the mob while you rez your pet. Hopefully, we can still Feign Death in most of these situations to get the same effect.

    Zeherah updated FemaleDwarf for the changes. It's possible she's not simming it 100% correct, but as BM, if I don't use Stampede, it's now a 1% dps loss... 1%!!!

    Stampede has been nerfed over and over again all to balance PvP. I cannot comprehend why Blizzard keeps screwing up PvP vs PvE by trying to balance both with the same tools. The nature of these two playstyles are so different that the abilities should be different as well. As it is, you can't make a change for PvE without affecting PvP and vice versa, so stop doing it!

    /rant

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    1. I read that and I am right there with you. Stampede being nerfed for PvP is stupid. First off, PvE needs to stop bending over backward for PvP. This is a PvE game and they should try to remember that. Second, they could just make stampede not usable in arena. Third, the other team could, you know, play better and beat you.

      They nerfed stampede because of bad PvPers crying over it. Bad players that did not understand how stampede even works.

      They should at least still cast growl and buffs. This is a horrible change.

      /rants with you.

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