I'm not so good at this

The fun part is, this could mean anything! I really WANT to update this more, but as all the good bloggers suggest, I'm still trying to find my voice.

Which is hard, when you don't actually write. Oops. Details...

Also, I tend to try to write at work. Since my job isn't terribly taxing, I can get away with it. Some days it's hard to find time, or come up with anything to write about while I drive to work.

That isn't QQ about how people can't seem to dodge gigantic waves of lava.

OS3D attempts occurred. 2 hours worth. Ah, the life of a Hunter. 'Shadron is in the Raid, can I get an MD already? Why isn't he MDed?' /sigh. Could you kindly call out the healers that die to flame wave number 3 too?

I take responsibility for my screw-ups. I typically do so publicly. I'm not sane, I expect myself to be perfect. All the time. In part, it stems from the fact I levelled a hunter later in the BC cycle, so everything I read told me how hunters suck, they're a dime a dozen, and if you mess something up expect a cursing out, raid kick, /gkick, 3-day ban, and a guy named Fat Tony knocking at your door. Or something, I'm not looking for the link that spelled it out.

What happend? I place myself at the far end of the island, in the safe spot from waves coming from the left hand side, my back to those waves so I can easily see the far waves and move. I then move back to my original spot. Kinda EZ-modes the flame waves for the Drake portion at least.

Bonus feature? I have several of the Raider Ranged DPS following my lead on that now. Yay for not looking incompetant.

Anyway, when the drakes land there's a little lull between the landing and the time you can actually target them. I clicked on the drake, but it picked up Sarth, way behind him. It didn't move Sarth, but it's also didn't really get Shadron to go where I wanted, since bullets whizzing by his nose doesn't QUITE have the same effect. And I called myself out on it, made a quick macro of /tar Shad /cast Aimed Shot (lazy Hunter didn't respec out of the 1/18/52 build for HP after 10 man )S2D attempts, but that's down too!) and problem was solved.

Other mistakes? One funny, one not so much. The funny one? Don't MD pull with Explosive Shot. Stupid ticks. 1 quick FD and Sarth was back on the tank and my face was still attached.

The other I also took a heaping helping of poo for, and it was totally out of my control. I lead off the MD to the MT on that, and 1 pull I just got unlucky and got no crits. Couple that with a druid bear tank that seems to be ok with just WAITING for the boss to come rather than tossing a Faerie Fire, and someone ended up dead, a healer I think, who did something too early.

As I'm getting bitched at, I told them I'd work on my RNG skills and hit the buttons harder next time. The druid tank also decided to actually generate his own damn aggro too to cover for my clear incompetance. So that's fun.

What's hard though, is that while my errors (which I will fess up to) are being publicly stated over Vent, NOTHING is being said to try and diagnose why people keep 'randomly' dying.

And I can't for the life of me figure out why people don't stand in safe areas, why they can't seem to see the lava or listen to the calls on Vent, or why it seems to be ok to tank the stupid adds ON TOP of the healers.

I had to be the jerk on the 10m +2 attempts, and after seeing the same sequence of events where the add tank moved to a particular spot and promply died 3 times in a row ask 'Is there something we can do to figure out why this is happening and what we can do about it?' Are tanks and healers just above scrutiny? Is it assumed that they are doing 'the best they can' and if something goes wrong it's just bad luck?

I don't get it. I do have some raid experience as a healer on my resto druid alt, but no tank experience. So I don't know that side of things. Or is it just an oddity that I'm able to see my eff-ups and diagnose them?

I'm confused, but at least at this point my raid spot, while still not a Raider, is all but locked up, I'm the first Member invite. So there's that. Yay.

Further Thoughts

OK, been able to play with Surv for a bit now. Really, really liking it. Some of my early assumptions were, well... off. I think I had a bad run and overreacted.

I do that.

I played with a 1/18/52 build for a while, and was really getting the hang of it. I just respecced again, to 6/14/51. Our OS run was scrubbed. Non-standard raid night, people brought alts. People didn't CHECK alts for Raid IDs.

Dear Blizz,

Please do something about this damn Raid ID issue. It is entirely too easy to get saved to a run.

Sincerely,
My Effing Emblems that I don't get

So, I ran some heroics. Ran into an interesting problem. I'd been running Aimed Shot in my rotation, the new build runs Multi. Moving is less of a joy in this build, since you have to stutter-step to fire off a Multi. Not sure if I'm a fan.

Tonight, Malygos goes down! Because he has to! We aren't running Naxx until he dies. And I need Emblems for new shoes!

3.0.8, Day ewww

10m Naxx last night. Don't want to use it as a judge. And, I did well, top dps on nearly every fight. The issue is, the run sucked.

Sorry, you are NOT so bored and geared on your mains that 5 alts should be in a Naxx run, leading to trying to 2-heal with a Alt Alt Tank and a DK that's OTing in a DPS spec. And a 1200 dps mage.

Needless to say, Patches did not die.

And I get to bang my head against a wall with them more on Monday.

10m Naxx doesn't exactly give a great idea of the true dps capability of your dps. But, it did what it needed to. Gave me time to work on my rotation, getting used to the fact that it's not just 2 buttons. That said... I might macro it to 2 buttons. I'm missing shots, or delaying shots, or...

Trapdancing is SO foreign, I tried it on a boss or two, and it's just felt... wrong. And I really do need LnL proccing to show up in ginormous letters.

I might be too stupid to play this spec! =)

It was enjoyable though. 11k KS crits, W/O any pally buffs, are a wonder to behold. I might hit 15k fully buffed. And I will dorkgasm all over vent.

3.0.8, Day 1

Yay. Aspects are off the GCD, sorta. They still kind of act like it. It seemed to start the GCD, but didn't finish it, like a failed attempt at casting a spell, when you're silenced or some such.

I went Survival. Yay for not BM! I chose to forego a little dps (~20, according to the spreadsheet) in order to put 2 points in Hunting Party. My guild isn't truly progressing at this point, with only that bastard dragon on 25 left, and I'd rather have a little utility for 10s and Heroics and such. Ulduar, however... if we go for a true progression group, I will go to the Theoretical Max DPS build, which is 6/14/51 with no Hunting Party.

Also, I need to learn to trapdance. It's scary. It's so far outside of the norm, but I'm looking forward to trying it. Thaddius might be my first attempt. That's a SUPER easy boss to do it. You run through him anyway!

I did do a 25m Vault, we rushed so I didn't ensure I had Might. I kicked out 3500 DPS, good for #5 on the meter, and beating out the other hunter who has better gear specced 19/51 Surv. I lost to a HAT Rogue, TG Warrior, Mage, and Warlock, all of whom outgear me.

I'm OK with those results. I wish they were better, but I think that may actually be my best dps for that silly fight. I'm relying on my own anecdotal evidence, as I look at DPS meters, say 'Neat' then promptly forget it.

All in all, I'm excited. There is a lot to relearn. I now find myself watching CDs on shots, and I think a minor UI resign is in order to help me out. I need like 53898 point font telling me when LnL procs, rather than me mashing Expl Shot and thinking GO TO CD! Why won't you CD!?!

3.0.8 is upon us!

Mmm, respeccing. I spent my last raid wishing I was anything but BM. Now, I get to do it. Surv, here I come! Does my guild NEED more Replenishment? No. We have too many Ret pallies. But, that means that I'm guaranteed to have it in 10s, AND I can put minimal points in it. Of course, due to the nature of SURV... 40% should be more than evoung to proc every 10s. Or 20s. I don't remember. But good times!

I'm stoked. Too bad I don't get to raid tonight. Stupid brother stupid movind stupid back from stupid California. Stupid.

Remua, Champion of the Frozen Wastes

That doesn't suck. Having a portion of your self-worth coming from a game probably isn't the healthiest thing in the world, but, y'know... still feels pretty damn good having that above your head. And, within 2 weeks of joining my new guild. Malygos25 is next, we've spent an inordinate amount of time on him. My feeling is that phase 2 is going too long.

Well, that and no one seems to be able to stack dots. And, on every boss fight, you need more DoTs!! Even I had issues with it, and I was got to 20+ 2 times on 10. But, no biggy. We switched gears and 2 shot OS+1. Apparently, we're only the 10th guild on server to do that (of course, the same would be true of Heroic Malygos, but another hour there would have led to insanity, and left OS loot on the table for the week, and that's no good.)

Epeen aside, I really wanted to talk about 3.0.8. You know what? I'm excited. This patch is going to seperate those hunters that know what the hell they are doing from those that like it because they can get to 80 without thinking, then spam trade for heroics and raids.

I've spent a lot of time on the spreadsheet. It's way more involved than it used to be. When there's only 1 spec that's worth talking about, a lot of variables are removed. Now, it's not only swapping specs, but you also have to edit shot rotations to find where your max dps is going to be. I was set on 53/18 BM, looking 'forward' to SS+AS spam for the rest of time. Then, I actually modified my shot rotation, and discovered that there's a Surv build thats several hundred dps better.

I'm not a numbers guy. Ok, I am. I just don't have the patience to lay everything out. But, I love this build. And, from what I understand, trapdancing cannot be modeled effectively on the spreadsheet, so this build leaves open the possibility that a skilled hunter can do MORE DPS than the spreadsheet shows (unless it is already modeling LnL procs every 30s, but even then there's the itty-bitty DPS from Explosive Trap (ok, let's see if I managed not to bork up the wowhead tagging) taht I can tell from the Shot Rotation Test that's not modeled.

At any rate, I'm excited. I also got my Valorous Gloves, and discovered I'm close to actually qualifying for EPGP priority, so I'm not just hoping for leftovers. I have to miss Naxx this week due to family obligations, which will cut way down on EP for the week, but... couple more guild firsts for me and I'm all set. That's exciting, as Black Ice becomes feasible! WTB 2H AGI enchant for surv, pst!

Boomkin - the new huntard?

OK, everyone is out there bemoaning DKs as the new 'class that the clueless play.' And there are good reasons for that, I can see where the little kids that are asking for ZF run number 85749835798 to get some blue to level in because they Just Can't Do It TM without it running to that class.

Maybe I missed the worst of it since I don't run instances while I level, so I've only seen 80 DKs, and the earliest ones were typically the best players. Point is, DKs haven't been too bad in my eyes. Boomkins, on the other hand... guh.

Admittedly, I'm biased. The Guild I raided with in BC, the GM/RL/MTs now wife played a Boomkin. This is not inherently bad. The example she set was. Cackling about pulling aggro, TRYING to pull aggro by timing Starfire to hit at the same time the tank does... healers should not have Shield MACROS for DPS. On trash. Nope.

As top DPS, it drove me nuts, since other people would follow suit. I can't tell you how many times we had to raise 5 or more people on trash in Gruuls Lair due to her causing those damn ogres to run amock amidst our healers. When I rolled into instances on my Resto Druid, stupid DPS got no heals from me. You wanna screw up the raid? Here's a repair bill. I'm sure as hell not doing much to get on that mobs aggro table. I don't want to be next.

Her argument is that I had FD, she didn't. What she didn't realize was that I endeavored to NOT have to use it. And typically, when I did... it was due to someone else messing up and me trying to burn something to save them. (And, she 'off-healed' a lot, that's why I beat her in DPS. Every time.)

That skews my perception, admittedly. But, PuGging heroics led me to run with a great variety of people. Many of them are Boomkins that can't seem to find healers. Moving on from that irony... Typhoon is the worst imaginable PvE spell they could have gotten. I can't tell you how many damn lazerchikkens I've seen indiscriminately pull aggro, wait for the mob to be just on them, then cast that silly spell and pray that I burn the mob with them before it smites them.

Which I do. It's my own damn fault. I enable this behavior. I swear, my pocket healer and I, one of these times... just going to let them die. Maybe they'll learn. I don't know what it is. It must be a combination of that spec being truly viable and there being a lot of Kara+ geared resto druids that respecced Balance to level and never looked back. But really, it's got to stop.

I've been pleasantly surprised by the general competence of the players I've run with. Getting to 80, for now, has seperated the skilled players from the maroons. Heroics are easier than they were as well. But there's something about Boomkins...