Too Greedy - WoW and Gold, The Perfect Combination: Raiding

Showing posts with label Raiding. Show all posts

This week, I came back to raiding. This is part of my Cataclysm preparation, because as you know, I came back to the game recently, so it's good for me to start reliving everything again. Since I returned, I've probably been spending more time handling all my stocks and gold than anything else, so I'm now trying something "new". (Raiding posts may be reborn!)

Diversifying has been the key to not becoming insane. I've been doing PvP (even though I'm a noob), raids, mount hunting (got my Albino Drake now), and my auctions are still selling at the same rate, which shows me that I probably shouldn't have been spending so much time looking at Auctioneers in Orgrimmar. Gold is my main passion, but I'm moderating my behaviour now.

I know Cataclysm is getting close, and sometimes it feels that time isn't enough because November 2nd is only a month and a half away, but why not relax a bit and prevent yourself from getting burned before it arrives?

In case you're going through the same, take my words for it, try new waters, they're still as refreshing as making gold like a mad man, even if you're too greedy like a certain person.

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Finally we get some love too, and damn, does the Frost Witch set look nice! It's definitely the best looking set, don't you agree? :)

I can't wait to get my hands on it. This definitely deserves a whole blog post, since I'm a shammy.
Nah, not posting only to talk about a new Tier set.

Last night, I raided Ulduar 25, and was the first on the healing meters, with the lowest overhealing.

We downed Mimiron, G.Vezax, but no Yogg-Saron, due to some lack of DPS. This night was far from perfect, because lots of people couldn't show up for some reason, and we had to replace them with people who were worse geared and some even had to DPS in their off-spec, which is usually not as good as the main spec.

Nonetheless, raiding again was fun. I hadn't raided for nearly 2 weeks now, and really enjoyed it. It was more interesting than a farm run in ToC Normal anyway, where we just collect loot in each 5 minutes.

My favourite raid, however, is ToC 25 Heroic, which I haven't done in a lot of time...hopefully I will go there again soon! I like it because it feels like a challenge, unlike all the other places. This will change in 3.3 though.

What about you, what's your favourite raid and why? :)

My gear is significantly better since my last update. I finally got a new mace, a new ring, and a new totem.

My performances have been rising in quality also. A few days ago, I've even reached 5,000 HPS on ToC 25 Heroic (a very good achievement for me). With all these upgrades, I'm also able to reach 3,000 Spell Power when I'm fully buffed and flasked. Things are working good for me, and I'm starting to enjoy playing again, now that I've got more time.

My guild's progress has improved also. We've finally killed Yogg-Saron on 25 man, and we're clearing every Normal Mode currently available in the game every Wednesday and Thursday, which allows us to go for Hard Modes on Mondays (our 3rd raid day).

That's it for the raiding updates. Now, onto even more shiny things: gold coins. The glyph market on the Horde is definitely worth it, just like on the Alliance. The glyphs have usually higher prices than they did on the Alliance, and they actually sell very often. The competition isn't very strong also, so I'm lucky once again!

Here's a partial example of a few hours after my posting session:

The total income was 543g.

(Oh, the accent!)

Yes, some glyphs sell for over 30-40g, and those are not even fallback prices! I'm digging deeper and deeper onto the glyph market every day, and my total glyph posting should reach 500 soon like they did on the Alliance. I still haven't got rid of the laziness and haven't really tried to even go mill "a few" herbs now that I'm over 50k gold. I've lost some of my momentum, but my regular income from glyphs is usually around 500g per posting session (only 200ish glyphs), which covers my raiding costs easily. Maybe I'll get going for 100k if I get the motivation for it soon. Until then, sorry, but don't expect those nice profits over 2k.

That is all for now! Things are definitely looking good.

The mace from Razorscale didn't drop again! And I wasn't the 1st on healing, so it wasn't one of my best nights! Erm, just kidding, healing wise it was good, but still...damn you Razorfail!

Well, Shamans still on top, what can I say?

We got everything until Freya down, everything except Thorim was one-shotted, can't complain about anything. Everyone played their A-Game.

Now, to other stuff...I have been having less and less time to play lately (only played a few hours - if that much! - last week), and I can hardly attend raids now because of RL. Hopefully the work will lower soon, so I can resume my WoWing full throttle. However, it hasn't been just about more work. I'm also getting kind of bored from the current content. Hard Modes don't feel special. It's just the same bosses with harder features, which makes it boring for me. I find myself logging in to get gold from my mule's mailbox, then log Verde, play around a little bit, do the JC daily, and sometimes raid. When there's no raid, I just log in, run around and log out (I'm sure all of you have felt like this before). Maybe I need a break until 3.3, or maybe it's just a temporary feeling because I got my hands on other games which are being released now. I'm seriously thinking about suspending my WoW play time, and perhaps this means Too Greedy may slow down, or even be "suspended".

There is challenge in ToC after all. After clearing ToC 25 Normal in less than an hour, and one-shotting Onyxia 25, we tried ToC 25 Heroic, and didn't even get past Northrend Beasts. The DPS wasn't enough for it, even though most people were above 4-5k. Apparently every DPS need 6k+, which is an amazing amount. Nothing too worrying, though, because we got ToC 10 Heroic on 4/5, which just means that we need to gear up some DPS a bit more.

I enjoyed this raiding day very much, and I was the second on healing, and again, one of lowest overhealers. First place was for a Holy Paladin who was doing 4,700 HPS, while I was doing "just" 4,000 HPS. Soon, I'll go to a hard mode again, and definitely have some more fun, because it was a great time, even with all the wipes.

Any thoughts you want you share on these Hard Modes? How are your guilds progressing there?

Guess where they tested me! Ulduar 25 with half the raid as alts, how flattering (even though I kind of understand ^^). It was actually fun, we killed FL, Razor, Ignis, XT, IC, Kolo, Crazy Cat Lady and Hodir (almost had time for Thorim), and it was a lot better than on my previous guild. Significantly less deaths, a lot more DPS, and well...both Shammies were on top of the healing meters (I was second behind the best geared Resto Shaman in the guild).

The main difference that I noticed between my old guild and this one is the raiding attitude. What I mean is, they actually care about doing their utmost in the raids, and actually are willing to replace people who aren't doing their best, or are "playing around" on Alts. This pleases me. It's a guild made of people who care about the whole social atmosphere, but aren't willing to sacrifice raid quality in exchange for it.

My first impression was definitely good, but I'm aware it's the officers and guild master's impressions that count, not mine, so I will wait a few more days and see how they evaluate what I'm made of. I'm confident they shouldn't be disappointed.

Raid night.
Crusader's Coliseum 10 man.
All bosses down except Anub'arak.
Everyone full of confidence for the raid.
All set, we talk to the guy there to make the floor collapse, nothing happens, and he disappears.

We didn't quit. After about 30-40 minutes the NPC reappeared, we engaged Anub'arak, and one-shot him! It was the first time we ever one-shotted a boss we had never tried before. I was also happy because I was #1 on healing again, but I was healing the MT, so it should be no big deal, I hope. Still, it's a huge difference against other healers (numbers 2 and 3).

1 day later (after the reset), we went to Crusader's Coliseum 10 again, and cleared the whole place in 1 hour and a few minutes!

The guild had 2 teams clearing the place that night, and after the other team was done too, we joined both groups together, got a few more members who were bored with the fact they didn't get a spot in the raids, and attempted the 25-man version, with 24 people. Everyone pulled their weight (to compensate the fact that some people are still a bit undergeared for it), and we downed Northrend Beasts.

Loot wise, I got 3 new items just in these couple of days. Really nice upgrades to help me boost my performances even more:

[Helmet of the Crypt Lord] dropped from Anub'arak in ToC 10.
It's now fully gemmed with the best: Insightful Earthsiege Diamond, Quick King's Amber, and enchanted with Arcanum of Burning Mysteries.

[Belt of the Ice Burrower] dropped from Northrend Beasts in ToC 25.
Gemmed with Energized Eye of Zul, and a Quick Dragon's Eye on the extra socket provided by a belt buckle.

[Nobundo's Handguards of Conquest], acquired by exchanging 30 Emblems of Triumph at the Emblem Gear Vendor.
Gemmed with a Quick King's Amber, and enchanted with +28 Spell Power, and it also allowed to get the "Set Bonus (2)", which raises my Riptide heals by 20%.

(Sorry about the orange links, they're not Legendary. Don't know how to change the HTML for blue/purple links.)

My current stats are as shown (with Water Shield and Earthliving). They're really balanced at the moment. SP, MP5, and Haste seem to be right where I want them for now (even though I'm still aiming for more Haste, to reduce my cast times slightly more).

Crusader's Coliseum 10 is now on farm, and from now on, we're gearing ourselves up in there, until Icecrown Citadel. We will slowly start doing Heroic modes too, we're on fire! Wish us luck! :)

Some peeps from my guild decided to attempt that really nice way of killing Sartharion with 3 Drakes, using 1 Tank, 1 Healer, and 8 DPS - the Zerg Tactic. The result:

Have you ever tried this way of killing Sartharion? Was it easy? :)

Now, 10 people in the guild have the title "Of the Nightfall". This is a great achievement, and we should rise in the guild ranking of our server (oddly, we only had Sarth+1 on farm). I hope this is somehow the motivation we need to keep pushing through Ulduar and eventually down Yogg-Saron (and do a few hard modes) before ICC. Or am I being too confident?

Now, a small gold tip you might find useful:

If you've recently started reselling stuff, I found that even though you should resell stuff that people use every day for their needs (Cloth, Enchanting mats, Ores, Metal Bars, Herbs...), you should not focus on the lowest level items. For example, Linen Cloth is no where near Wool Cloth in prices. Wool Cloth is usually more expensive, and Linen usually doesn't allow you good profit margins, thus not being worth reselling.
Also, the Enchanting trainers/vendors usually have a couple of Strange Dusts and/or Lesser Magic Essences selling for low prices (usually much lower than the AH price). You can resell those a lot more than what you bought them for.

Just like in real life, people should have pride in what they do. When we do something, we should focus on doing it right, and not do it just because we have to. Doing your job without even caring for it just shows how much of a "slacker" you are. If you don't care about doing your best, and everything you only care about is your pay check, you obviously think the same way when you're playing World of Warcraft.

If you're a raider, you must do your best, both before, during, and after raids.

Before the raids, you should make sure your gear is enchanted with the best available enchants for your role, you should be properly gemmed, you should have potions, flasks, elixirs, buff-food, and every sort of consumables to maximise your presence there. Those few extra stats like AP, SP, MP5 (etc.) you will get may not sound like much, but if everyone in the raid has those extra stats, you'll most likely progress easier.
During raids, you should pay attention during the encounters, you should know your spell rotations (which must be studied deeply before the raids, obviously), and you mustn't stand in the fire. Knowing tactics is a must.
After raids, you should enchant/gem any new gear you got, and also reflect on what happened during the raid. Did you do the best you could? Did others do the best they could? Any raid tracking tools are helpful for this. Numbers actually say a lot about someone.

I'm proud to be a good healer. I'm not cocky; I know my skills, and care a lot about my performances. When I compare myself to other healers, I often am on top of the effective heals (I never out heal a Priest, though), and got one of the lowest overhealing. When compared to other shamans, my Earth Shield often healed a lot more than others' (because I focus on ALWAYS keeping it up), I had more Critical heals (which also cause Ancestral Healing), and my Riptide ticked more often and for higher amounts (Riptide also causes Tidal Waves, which enhances both my HW and LHW. I choose which one to use according to the situation, of course). No special skills required really. To be good at it, I'm properly enchanted, gemmed and flasked, everytime. I'm always looking to learn more about my class, and there's always room for improving, either rotation or stats wise.

It's always about motivation; you don't need to be one of those obsessed gamers (who play 24/7) in order to show your skills as a player in WoW. However, you need to keep in mind that you can't achieve success on your own, so help others helping you (considering you're in a guild with good players), by doing it right. And does it feel good when you put out a hell of a performance!

Raiding without doing your best is irrational, because that means you're leeching skilled people, and not allowing them to progress, just because you expect easy purples. Why would you play this game after all then, if all you want is gear to show off to people you don't even know and don't care about?

We're a few weeks into 3.2 now, and my guild hasn't even cleared Ulduar 10 or 25 normal modes (we've downed 7 bosses on 25, and 10 bosses on 10 so far), but we've downed 2 bosses in Trial of the Crusader 10. My point is, are we far behind when compared to the majority of other guilds? According to WoW-Heroes, we're #47 on our server, when it comes to 25 man progress. On 10 mans, we're on #62. We're not hardcore raiders, but we do take raids seriously when we do them. Still, I have to admit some people on my guild may not have enough skills for it.

So, how many of you are actually more or less at the same place as me, with Ulduar half/three quarters cleared? What concerns me is that we're getting closer to 3.3, and I had the hope that I would have Ulduar on farm by the time it launched, and progress has been slow. On the other hand, we kept doing Naxxramas 25 after Ulduar came out, and it should happen again with Ulduar and Icecrown Citadel, so it might not be such a big deal.

Gevlon (at Greedy Goblin) explained why some "Guilds s(t)uck". He states that people are afraid to /gquit. Based on his "Skill > Gear" theory, it makes sense. People should find other players who are similarly skilled, if they want to achieve high goals. The thing is, and I'm speaking for myself, I have the skills, but I don't have the time to play on high-end guilds, who are clearing Hard Modes. They usually require a minimum attendance, often for far more than 3 hours a day, which I can't deliver. Not everyone has the money nor the time to even buy places in "better" guilds (even though I could use my money for it). The so called "casuals" can clear hard modes if they have the skills, but there aren't many guilds where you can find skilled casuals at all. So, what options does such a player have? He can: join an "average" raiding guild, which progresses slowly, and doesn't demand an every day attendance, or he can...? Stop playing MMOs?

Anyway, all I want is to have seen everything in all raids before Cataclysm. I'll be happy if I'm able to clear Icecrown in normal modes. Clearing hard modes would be amazing, but perhaps a player like me isn't suited to do it...? I still get to see content like people in "better" guilds, the difference is that their activities require better gear, and a RL possibility I currently don't have.

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