Pure and Epic Win

That's all I have to say.

Welcome to Heroic Ramparts. Speed of the Day? Jerkish.

I should learn by now that running Heroic Ramparts is the best place to meet star people. This run was no exception, but I did learn something from it! Story time first, and then the lessons learned, me thinks. There is a lesson -- or, perhaps, there are lessons -- that I have to pass on from this story!

It started out as a DPS warrior, a tank, a lock [these three from the same guild], Had rather a rough start (involving me forgetting that the stuff at the beginning hits harder (or so it feels) and I really ought to be in tree form and actually paying attention and healing rather than chatting with a few friends). So people died, and... well. I healed as I ran out. I don't think it garnered me much love, but... I tried to save them as they ran with me.

The DPSWarrior and the warlock each died two or so more times, but that was because they both pulled aggro and I had a choice of saving one or the other, as their health was going down rather fast. (I ended up saving (and trying to save the other as well) the one that was closest to where my mouse was at the current time).) Apparently, that wasn't good enough, so I later found out.

I managed to grab leader so I can mark (as I was tired of sitting around and waiting for the tank to mark. He was slow at it, and I was bored during the end stages of every fight, so I took up the task. We got to the second boss without *too* much incident though -- a few deaths, but nothing *too* out of the ordinary. Dying is normal in heroics, and especially in that one, in my books at any rate. Even if the tank is in ZA/Badges/Heroic gear, and I was about the same too. It happened. Bad pulls, "OH CRAP" moments, the "I HAS AGGRO AND CAN'T GET RID OF IT... and I'm dead" moments too. It's all a part of the lure of heroics.

Well, maybe not the lure, but we do heroics for some reason (besides badges, at any rate), and that's definitely part of what many people (if not everyone) experience in their heroic runs at one time or another.

Reasons Why I Heroic:

1. Badges
   
2. Chance to meet new people?
   
3. Chance to try out a new guild member?
   
4. Boredom. It completely beats farming alone.

Okay. So maybe not for the negative sides. But it's still a part of it.

Second boss rolls around, and I go ahead and ask the DPSWarrior to take adds. Mind you, I completely forgot the fact that we had a warlock -- I just saw his lack of mana and thought -- 'Oh, goody. He can take care of it! He doesn't have mana that gets eaten, unlike the lock and the mage!' -- and we went for the boss.

I died not too long in, then slowly the rest of the group (except the mage and the tank, who held out surprisingly long without a healer). Try two. Warlock tried to take care of the adds. Too many, too fast, apparently. I had assigned the DPSWarrior as his backup, but that didn't work either. Another wipe. Warlock had to leave before try three. I wasn't reading properly, and, as the warlock didn't actually leave, I was forced to remove him. I hate removing. I don't tend to do it right. Before I did so, I said in the chat: "Removing DPSWarrior". Paused. Didn't see complaints, removed the DPSWarrior.

And looked around for the replacement the warlock was talking about.

The mage spoke up: "I thought it was the warlock that was leaving."

Oh dear. Scroll back up. Yeah. Warlock.

... Look around. DPSWarrior was standing there. He had backed up slightly, and if animations were truly animated, I bet he would have been staring at me confused. Oops. I reinvited him.

And got chewed out by the tank. "REINVITE HIM BEFORE HE GETS GHETTO HEARTHED". Much less literate than that, but the effect was the same. At that point, I already had, and was on my way to kick out the warlock. Couldn't resist mentioning that they could have said something when I mentioned WHO I was on my way to kick...

But we got a rogue more or less, in one fashion or another. It took a bit; I couldn't find him, and, therefore, I had turned to a guildie, but he was currently trying to slaughter the last boss in Heroic Shadow Labs (ewww. -shudder-) and failing. Popped into LFG, and llo and behold! There was the rogue! Snagged him, went back in.

One more try. Transferred the duty to the rogue. DPSWarrior got the debuff. Didn't move away. Rogue died as I was working my tree arms frantically to try to keep the tank up. [Oh, I found this shirt while looking for an image of a casting tree. I like it!] The DPSWarrior may have been chasing a fel puppy or something, but all I saw was my health dropping, and, before I could do much about it, me dead. And everyone else died too. Surprise? Not too much. Normally, if the healer's down and there's no backup healer, group's just screwed.

Not so pleased with dying, I was, and, therefore, I spoke up [transcribed from screenshots -- this was easier than blurring out names, if you'll believe it]:

[Me]: DPSWarrior, you're killing us.
[Rogue]: i stayed away from you guys!!
[Me]: You had the debuff. Rogue died.
[Me]: You ran toward me.
[Me]: I died.
[Mage]: lol
[Rogue]: get'em!!!
[DPSWarrior]: How did you both die because I had the debuff
[Mage]: damn.
[Me]: The debuff ticks for 3156 on EVERYONE you're by.
[Rogue]: I have no idie lol
[Me]: Go through your logs.
[Rogue]: idea*
[Me]: [2:01:11] DPSWarrior has slain Lossemenel!
[Mage]: lol
[Rogue]: lol
[Me]: xD Tell that to the gear we're all repairing soon.
[DPSWarrior]: You hae let me die so many times I figured you had it comming
[Me]: Little less amusing then.
[Me]: Okay, you've just earned no heals for the rest of the instance.
[Me]: You killed Rogue as well, you know.
[Mage]: lol
[Rogue]: ouch!
[DPSWarrior]: What would change
[Mage]: can't we all just get along? :D
-shows healing meter. DPSWarrior is the one that is second on the healing taken meters, at 10.1% of the healing taken-
[Rogue]: nw
[Rogue]: i was dead in 2 sec anyways
[Tank]: yeah you better heal him or I'm out
[Mage]: lol
[Mage]: oh snap.
[Tank]: I could list 5 things why he was healed that much but I don't want to talk shit about everyone
[Tank]: you better stf
[Tank]: U
[Me]: I can list two things of why he was healed that much.
[Me]: And neither of them having to deal with me.
[Mage]: atleast no one is mad at me for polymorphing at wrong times now :P
[Tank]: will there I have a bigger list. I win
[DPSWarrior]: True
[Me]: Bigger list means nothing. One: Your tanking. Two: His aggro. Beat it.
[Rogue]: kk this time we kill this guy!
[Mage]: k lets finally finish this instance...
[Tank]: well I'm out
[Tank]: peace
[Mage]: ...
[Tank]: nah I dont need that
[ Both the Tank and DPSWarrior leaves, as they're guildies. ]
[Mage]: well that sucks oh well

Hrm. Apparently, the two weren't interested in knowing just why the DPSWarrior died more than everyone else. They just wanted to know why I didn't heal him.

I almost felt bad. Almost. But, really though? There was little I could have done to save the DPSWarrior. The times he tended to pull aggro happened to be when I was busy saving my tree hide, or when I was busy trying to save the hide of the warlock, who somehow also had pulled aggro. And, for my part, GCDs got in the way and the mobs hit too hard for me to save both. Had time to save one and start saving the other before the other died. Oh, the woes of being a healer and having DPS that just didn't know how to watch their aggro.

Despite that, however, the DPSWarrior had little right to say that I had it coming.

We interrupt this post with the following... interruption.

Mini How-To: How to Irk Your Healer

1. Saying: "HEAL ME!" -- by anyone. It's our job to heal. Staring at health bars are pretty all we do. We know you're injured. We're either in the middle of a cast to heal you, our HoTs are ticking away on you already, or we're healing someone else who is dying.
   
2. Saying: "I didn't bother saving you because you didn't heal me." -- If we didn't heal you, it's generally one of two reasons. And, usually, the reason does not tend to be because we don't like you. Normally, we "didn't heal [you]" because a) you died too fast or b) someone else was being healed instead, and you died while we were saving them. Not because we chose to completely ignore your dropping health bar.
   
3. Not Understanding this Concept: Quite honestly, it boils down to this: Tanks are important. Healers are important. They get priority to living. DPS are not so much. If the tank and healer needs healing, we're going to keep us up before we keep you up. You're DPS. Watch your aggro. If you exceed, stop DPSing. If you can't resist hitting them, white attacks. If you're a class that has an aggro drop of some sort, use it. You're not as important as the tank/healer. Get over it. Want to be the center of attention? Roll a tank.
   
   
4. General: Bandages! First of all. Everyone should have maxed out FA. Second of all. If you aren't a tank (or even a healer, at times), and you're hurt, and the healers are working hard to keep the tank up, step back and help them by bandaging! That way, there's less of a chance you'll die, and the healers won't have to stress to try to get you in between keeping everyone else up.
   
5. General: Getting eaten by the mobs that are supposed to be CCed. And said DPS whom the CCed mob belongs to is busy DPSing, or even pulling aggro. Heeeeey, guys? You won't get very far without a healer. Watch your CC!
   
6. Tank (or anyone, even), that pulls more than they could handle, and then whining when they die. And when their DPS dies. And when the healer dies. Oh, and when the healer doesn't die as well. Sure, they might be awesome, but their healers sometimes might not be able to keep up with all of the damage being taken.
   

With two pulls beside that boss left, me not healing him probably wouldn't have been that big of a deal. He just had to watch his aggro and not stand in the fire. Not good enough, apparently. Either that, or it's just too big of a thing to swallow: the healer was refusing to heal you. Either way, it was the tank that got upset about it. Guild bond, I suppose. Still. I don't take well to being told that I deserved to die because I let him die. I really don't take well to being told that I fail for not healing him. He can go and bandage for the rest of the instance as far as I was concerned. I was still going to heal the tank -- he hadn't really insulted me at that point (beside the snide comment that pointed at me for being the reason his guildie died), and... well. He was the tank. Oh, and he had put together the group.

They did leave after all, and then the mage decided that he didn't want to wait (he was a PvP mage. Hated waiting) while I got replacements. I had to say I didn't feel bad, for I rather felt that I was in the right. (I tend to. Feel free to pop that nice bubble of mine if you disagree.) Sure, it wasn't too nice, but... They deserved it?

Replacements and summons took less than five minutes, and ten minutes later, we had downed the second boss. No issues what so ever. (Replacements being a moonkin, a hunter, and a pally tank.) Ten minutes after that, Narzan was down. Two free and painless badges for our replacements, a nether for our pally tank, and both the hunter and the moonkin received a needed blue from the chest. Quick, painless, and useful loot for them. Couldn't ask for anything better.

Oh. One last thing. The Reinforced Fel Iron Chest really enjoys keeping my Tree-Mender's Belt from me. Good thing I love it just as much as it loves me. I'll be seeing a lot more of Vazruden and Narzan, that much is for sure.

What else is new?

Side note: Thanks to Matt and Jez for the note about how to make my lists a bit easier on my poor, overworked (only from trying to post) brain.

Site Clean-Up

I've realized that some bits of the site can be made to flow better -- such as my informational posts, some of them can go under the chain of articles that I wanted to create, and didn't even realize I was writing under it until... well. I was going through my Informational Post links in my sidebar and realized that it would work.

So while it's not quite being under construction, it is under editing, so if anything gets screwed up, I apologize before-hand.

[ Roleplaying III ] :: A Character Template

-listening to Twisted Nether Blogcast- But, in between listing to BBB and Pike (yeah, I'm catching up -- if BBB can do Kara, notice flame wreaths and NOT MOVE, I can listen to him and Pike and write, right?), I noticed (with growing dread), that the votes on roleplaying kept climbing... So here's the next part of my little series. [Little Edit: Up to ChickGM now, Auzara. And still haven't posted this. I'm such a slacker -- why do people read this blog anyway?]

One of my roleplaying sites -- Aparecium, a Harry Potter roleplay (hush. I like it) -- along with some of the other roleplay sites I've visited, have a template to complete before one can become a full time member. A character template, a guideline for one's character development. Here's Aparecium's character-sheet (lightly edited).

Basics
Full Name;
Nickname(s);
Age;
Gender;
Date of Birth;
Year(if student);
House/Loyalty;
Blood;
Other;

Appearance
[code][ Celeb Name|Character Name ][/code]
150+ words.

Personality
300+ words.

Personal History
250+ words.

Family Background
80+ words.

Roleplay Example
Insert example here. 400+ words.

As a note, Aparecium's word count "guides" are just that. Preferably, we suggest you have more (as more is always impressive), and, generally, most people go either over it by a bit, or go over it by so much that one doesn't even want to read it. As in... 1461 words for a personality of someone's character, or a friend of mine deciding to put six-thousand words for his entire background (we died a bit inside to see it). How long it should be is [generally] up to you, however much you know about the character, and however much you care to share.

Other applications get a lot more detailed, but don't have word counts, such as the following:

full name: answer

nicknames:answer

birthday: answer

age: answer

hair/eye color: answer

height/weight: answer

piercings/tattoos: answer

clothing style: answer

scars: answer

likes: at least ten

dislikes: at least ten

fears: answer

quirks/habits: answer

random facts: answer

goals: answer

flaws: answer

secrets: answer

personality: two paragraph minimum

sexual orientation: answer

turn ons: answer

turn offs: answer

mother: answer

father: answer

siblings: answer

significant other: answer

children: answer

pets: answer

history: three paragraph minimum (read the rules to check acceptable paragraph length)

Okay, so maybe that was a little too detailed, a lot of "I-don't-really-want-to-know" things. What is a good medium? It's up to you, as the creator of the character, to decide. The best way to do it, I find, is to figure out what you would like to know about a person if you were meeting them in person. What traits of theirs is important to note? What characteristics would attract/repulse you in a person?

How very self centered. I know. But hey. Whatever you want to know about someone, I bet someone else is just as curious about it.

Most of these are fairly self explainatory. Actually, most of the second template explains the first: Appearance, Personality, Personal/Family Background. Appearance, obviously, they want to know what your character looks like. How tall/short is she? What color hair/eyes? Scars, piercings, anything that distinguishes her appearance? A blue eye and a brown eye? Personality. How do they act around friends, around strangers, or even alone. What do they like/dislike/fear? What goals do they have in life, what secrets may they be hiding (yes, your character probably has a secret, even if you don't know it -- most people do!). Even which way they swing, if you care to add that. Background -- where do their family come from? How was your character's childhood? What was it like? Background is often very important to explain how/why a character acts the way they do. [Such as my Lynn. She's utterly terrified of being alone with a man in a room because her stepfather abusing her as a young girl.]

For me, a character sheet is a way to help me learn more about my character and what makes her tick. In doing so, others can learn more about a character, and maybe want to help you develop it through roleplaying.

With all of this in mind, I really ought to go and finish Nattie's personal history and iron out the little kinks... Maybe she'll end up killing her mother's murderer, which is what brings her to be so dispassionate about killing -- the "I've killed once, I might as well kill again" mindset.

Good luck with your own characters!

Repair All... Oh, God. I'm giving *how* much gold to him?!

Ugh. I was too tired to blink last night, much less post.

Six hours of playing. Six hours of dying. Six hours of two/three bad players. Not even PuGs! Our own guildie, who has been seventy, and a warrior, for a while now!

Okay, let me back up.

So I was considering writing my template post for here (haha... Yeah, concerning it... It's currently lost in the pile-of-drafts-that-I-really-need-to-get-to-someday-soon, but, anyway!), and I decided to hop online. Maybe get some inspiration, y'know how it goes. I see an old friend of mine on -- a druid who has recently gone resto for PvP. (It's rather weird to think of him as resto -- Awin has almost always been feral for as long as I've known him -- since pre-BC.) Tree-PvP-Resto though... and we decided to give him practice healing.

Not healing me though -- there just happened to be a tank in LFG -- Heroic Slave Pens. Whoot! Three free badges, as soon as we grab two more DPS! Snag him, look around for DPS.

Nothing when I ask. Awin decides to ask in LFG, and he gets responses.

So I ask for his secret.

"I don't use roleplay-speak."

"What? It was just "Looking for two more for Heroic Slave Pens. (CC preferred!)"... the second time around, anyway." [Roughly.]

[What he used was "LF2 Heroic SP" or something to that sort.]

"Fine. Names?"

A hunter and a rogue, who left before the instance started, and we got a mage instead.

[courtesy of Pike, of Aspect of the Hare. Fun blogger, by the way! Definitely go check her out!]

While we were gathering at the stone, Awin decides to tell me the one big thing he forgot to mention about the hunter:

He didn't know what SP was. And that Awin hoped that he didn't have a heroic key.

...Oh, God. What has he gotten us into? I pop onto WoWArmory, and look up his rep.

"...He has his key." Oh, this was going to be fun. I go back to his gear tab. Blues and greens. Even more fun.

Okaaaaay. Maybe the mage will be better. Look him up. Blues, a few greens, and... er... Is he wearing the Hallowed Garments for his chestpiece, or are my eyes deceiving me?

Nope. He was wearing them.

All righty. I am dreading the run even before we start. I un-alt-tabbed, and first thing I see is two of our party members dead, and the third one about to die. I back out of the instance (as I was standing right in). Look around. See the hunter being the only other one alive. Whisper Awin: "What happened?"

"The hunter ran into them."

"...He did what??"

"Ran into them?"

"Oh, joy..."

But they get their bodies back and we move on.

I was on Losse, who I had recently respec'ced feral again, and we officially pulled stuff.

First thing I noticed? The DPS sucked. Both the hunter and the mage were doing twenty-percent of the DPS each. Give or take. I was doing forty-percent. And using boss-rotation to kill stuff due to DoTs and it generates less aggro than huge crits of Shred. Second thing? Tank had very little aggro over anything. I'd end up tanking for a few moments while he found his taunt button. Forty-percent of the damage! Oh, geeze! We're in a heroic and I do forty-percent of the damage?! This was going to be a very long and painful run.

Tank (flavor: warrior), Awin (tree), and I each died another once or twice times before we got to the end of the first tunnel (and to the open space where Ahune resided for the duration of the Midsummer Fire Festival). Notice that the neither mage nor hunter did.

Pull the guy with his slaves... and the tank, Awin, and I die again -- didn't expect him to run into the mobs and fight them there, so... Awin had out-of-range issues, and the tank dropped. I went bear, and was trying to keep the slavemaster away from everyone else before Awin dropped due to a stray slave, and I die shortly after.

Recover, do that pull fine. The we'll-be-very-very-sneaky-and-not-have-to-kill-the-pat part was hard for our hunter, apparently. Ran directly into the slavemaster, and the pat came back just at that time. Another wipe.

So we fired the the huntard.

Got Cil's warlock to replace him. First group of defenders, I hop up, toss on healing gear, and helped heal the tank because he was being squashed on regular pulls and it was a struggle for Awin to keep him up...

I was proud of myself. I actually used Cower for the first time in... forever. Alarms of aggro! COWER! And Cil was terrified of getting a crit (for, apparently, he gets 5K shadowbolts on his lock -- I'm torn between envy (wishing my frostbolts critted for that much!) and fear (to be on the end of one of those!)).

So, Cil, who plays a warrior as his main, asks about what abilities the tank was using. Not the right ones, apparently, and was macro tanking. [Which brings us to the question -- is warrior tanking that hard that you need macros to do it? Oh, and why does looking up "human prot warrior wow" come up with pictures of paladins, cows, undead, orcs... you get the point. Oh, and a mage as well.]

Boss. Wipe due to a freak accident of the group behind us pulling. Boss again. (By the way. Feral kitty on totems is terrible. Kills DPS -- Mine, at any rate.) Somehow, we struggle through it. By after the second boss, I was tired of the tank not being able to tank, and I got mean, and went bear and picked up the third tank mob when there was one, and rushed after anything that was going after Awin (nomnomnom -- tasty healer!). Don't think it made the warrior too happy, but he wasn't at all open to suggestions about his tanking style, how to improve his threat generation, or anything at all, even.

Three pulls later, he has to go do something in RL. Doesn't actually leave the group, and I get passed leader. I go bear and tank the next four pulls (wiped once -- stuck my ugly bear face where it didn't belong and pulled four mobs when no one was ready). Warrior isn't back, so we replace him with a DPS warrior from the guild. Dee [fake name. >_>].

Free badge for him, for we one shot the boss.

Thirty more badges until my Embrace of Everlasting Prowess! [Uggggh. Shouldn't have bought those epic healy gems for my hat...]

Lesson of that run: If you want to ask in... well. Not-proper-English, don't expect well-geared (or even know how to play their class) people to join.

"Another run?"

Warrior: "Sure. I need to go prot before the raid though."

"Go prot now. You can tank."

"Okay."

Cil puts it together while I run around looking for the mats for +15 agility to my shiny new Merciless Gladiator's Dragonhide Gloves (to replace Verdant Gloves, which I've had forever).

Heroic Ramparts this time. Well, I can vouch for three of the four people that we had in the group... And the forth is a guildie. He can't be too bad, can he?

Note to self: Dee can't tank. He has tunnel vision, and is slow to build up aggro.

Healer kept dying, and the hallway of Hell was just that -- three wipes in the hallway that held the four casters and the melee guy (one on top of the ramp). I had brought Mel for the CC, and we found a shaman out of no-where (having got rid of the mage from Heroic Slave Pens).

What should have been an easy run turned into something that lasted a long long time, and a decent repair bill -- fifty-something for the tasty plate. Not me though, so I wasn't too bothered. Still, irksome. I ended up grabbing Losse two pulls before the second boss so I can pick up the mobs that tend to go running by Dee and try to own Awin (why did I get so lucky with Tanks with Tunnel Vision (TVV) today?!)...

Oh. And, after all of that, I didn't get my Tree-Mender's Belt. Still.

Just recalling all of this mess makes me want to curl up and cry.

And makes me wonder: are people just really that bad at playing, or is that normal and Cil and I are just that awesome?

[Please say the former. Our egos can't take it if it's the latter, and, therefore, don't tell us if it really is so!]

[ Healing Strategy ] :: Beneath the Branches of Zul'Aman

Had some time, so a friend decided to kidnap me to Zul'Aman.
Some back-history on the place:
It had once been a vast forest land. Troll land. The Amani trolls ruled over the a large portion of Lordaeron, and their empire was called Zul'Aman. What currently is called by name used to be their version of a capital. Centuries ago, the high elves of Quel'Thalas and the humans of (guess where?) Lordaeron banded together to defeat the empire. They were partially successful; the two groups drove the forest trolls into a small corner of northeastern Lordaeron. They have always controlled one part of the land, however: the sprawling forest. That forest has taken on the name of the empire, for it is the remnant of what was once a vast civilization.

Ever since the downfall of Quel'Thalas and Lordaeron, the troll seek to regain their former glory. The decimation of the trolls bred hate for their attackers: they will stop at nothing to protect the remains their land from those who are neither their kind, or those that wander the forest naturally. They are not the only thing travelers should fear, however: the Scourge can also be found in the woods, hunting the elven refugees.

Zul'Aman is a heavily wooded area. Warlord Jin'zakk, his witch doctors and shamans are in charge of the land, and their magic permeate the climate. Ziggurats dot the land... the trolls are seeking what was once theirs.

Beware, travelers... Beware.

Boss Overview (Roughly. What I deemed important, at any rate, which could mean absolutely nothing!):

• -Nalorakk (ze' bear boss -- right): HoTs are delicious! Keep them up. All the time. (Why in Elune's name you wouldn't keep HoTs up as a tree is beside me, but do it!) His silence is nasty, and without your lovely HoTs during those two seconds may just be the difference between phat lewts for the raid, or another repair bill. Two tanks on this one, folks. Bear form and troll form. One tank for each form. Be sure to see exactly who is tanking which form (and, if you forget, target the boss himself and see who he is looking at) so you know who to start stacking heals on!
• -Akil'zon (eagle boss): Everyone stand UNDER whoever has become the cynosure for the Electric Storm. He's an umbrella that will save you from the deadly lightning -- how that works, I'm not quite sure. Don't umbrellas attract lightning?
• -Halazzi (lynx -- below): If you're a tank, and on the lynx spirit, actually catch it. Stray lynx running around usually mean they crave healers for dinner. And you actually need your healers. I know the floor may look awfully tasty, but... it's not time for napping. Oh, and totems are bad. Get rid of them.
• -Jen'alai (dragonhawk): If you've got a lovely tin can with shiny golden spells tanking your adds (meaning, a paladin), keep them up. I know the shiny orbs that appear every so often are shiny and makes you want to touch them and stand in their pretty light, but don't. [Fire bombs.] They'll kill you, and you'll be watching the fight from the floor, instead of making a dent in the damage meters (but don't pay too much attention to those, or you'll have aggro issues!). Oh, and fiery walls? They hurt. Summary: Fire hurts. Don't touch it. Or stand in it. Or do anything near it.
• -Hex Lord Malacrass [right]: It's another group of five mobs. Aren't you starting to hate these? Gruul's, Moroes, Magister's Terrance, and Kael too, and now here? Gross. But, hey. You can CC these! There's one for every CC: sleep, banish, sheep (or sap, but... well... don't sap. Doesn't turn out well), and shackle. If you're CCing, recast your CC before and after each Spirit Bolt. One add per Spirit Bolt interval. Shadow resistance is nice. Soul Drain! He'll take on the aspect of someone in the raid, and gain some of their abilities. For the proper reactions to said abilities, check a tactics site. [Hood of the Third Eye], dropped for me there. Not as good as the druid version ([Helm of Natural Regeneration]), but hey. Who am I to whine?)
• -Zul'jin [below]: So... think the other bosses were hard? Wait until you get to this one. Zul'jin is not a piece of cake (okay, maybe it is for people like Matt, but... hey. We're not Matt. Oh, hey. That reminds me. Your armory link for Mallet is broken, you know). There's five phase to it -- every phase appears at ever twenty-percent (20%). Between every phase, there's an aggro drop, so watch your aggro in those first few moments! Anyway! First phase is the Troll phase. He whirlwinds (which melee should run like hell out of), and he Grievous Throws. Whoever that debuff is on really needs to be healed to full. No matter how hard it is to do as a tree. One will get raid aggro otherwise. -sigh-
  
• Phase two -- bear. Remember Midnight and Attumen? Almost like that. Stand behind him (okay, under his bum, but hey...), and priests should be mass dispelling the Creeping Paralysis (if not everyone, at least the tank, healers, and themselves. If they don't, one becomes Paralysis -- being stunned for four seconds could, again, be fatal).
  
• Phase three, eagle, with the tornadoes, brought around my death. All three times. No HoTs during this this phase -- Healing Touch only (Regrowth is all right too, I suppose). Therefore, you should be out of tree. And it ought to make dodging the tornadoes easier. Try not to be paralyzed during the beginning of this phase (like me. Tornado came and smacked me around right after, before I had time to do anything). Good time to wand up though -- he just stands around and hopes that you run into the Feather Vortex (tornadoes) and get chucked back... behind the fiery walls where you are useless.
  
• Phase four, a lynx. Behind him, again. He will cast Claw Rage every so often, meaning that he'll hit one person really rather hard consecutively, and said person needs to be healed. A lot. Or, if one has a paladin, and the subject to this abuse is a healer, BoP them. You really want them to be alive. He goes Hunting every so often -- it's his form of an AoE. Nine times he will lash at at different people, dealing damage and leaving a rather nasty DoT behind. Don't need to say to heal them, do I? And, last but not least, his dragonhawk form -- "a DPS check. A test to see if you survive the other phases". Heeeey, remember me saying that fire is bad? Yeah. Columns of fire will spring up underneath you. Move out of them. They're ugly. Flame Breath -- similar to a mage's Dragon's Breath, from what I understand. Cone of fire in front of them. Melee DPS, beware. Spread out if you can. Burn him down quickly, or Flame Whirl -- a short fiery whirlwind which will add a debuff to everyone in the raid, increasing fire damage taken by fifty-percent (50%) will get you, and his other flame abilities will scorch you.
  
• -Aaaaaaaaaaaaand.... well. You're done. Phat lewts all around. (Don't forget the chests of lewt that appear if you do the timed event (the first four bosses) within forty-five minutes! Twenty minutes to start, killing bear will give you fifteen, and killing the eagle will give you ten. Forty-five. Each boss is holding a hostage prisoner (would that be just too redundant? -shrug-). After the timed run (and I highly suggest you don't actually free the prisoners after every boss -- it takes too long! Thus the after), go back and officially free them. They'll be so grateful, they'll give you a chest of something purple and shiny! (And if you get all four in time, you'll get a swing at the famous [Amani War Bear] (that'd be nifty now, wouldn't it?)!).) [Lotsa parenthesis there!]
  

Things I learned:

• -Competing with a shaman on healing meters as a tree that is a lot less geared than said shaman is useless. Note: brain heal is a cheat. Second note: Not knowing the raid situation and, therefore, dying a lot, doesn't help too much either.
• -Seeing through trees just doesn't happen. Make sure you can see your character running, otherwise, the path you thought you were supposed to be going may just be filled with creeps your raid decided not to kill.
• -Bell was right. We are indeed plotted plants -- thus, cause of a death. (Didn't actually catch onto the "follow the raid" part when they were sneaking past a mob with Soothe Animal on it. Might have been okay if I wasn't creeping along and tripping over my roots. Oops! At least I knew to commit suicide rather than to cause a wipe... -coughs-)

Maybe I should hop on more. I seem to go to exciting places when I do.

Credit to Cilan of Rising Nova [guild] and Matticus of World of Mattius for allowing me to pick apart their brains so that I could do most of this justice. Oh, and WoWWiki, as always, for the tiny details I'd never know about...

Side note: for those of you watching this post through RSS feed, I'm sorry about all of the changes. I really need that "Before Publishing" check-list from Matt... It's the one thing that is never on my mind: what happens to the RSS feed if I keep changing stuff. Oh, and Matt? Kudos to you for putting up with me picking on you. And for reading over this post and putting a bit more detail into it.

Oh, goodness...

I have three and some change posts in the making. I just... have been ridiculously busy doing absolutely nothing.

Okay, perhaps not *nothing*, but a whole lot of procrastinating. On both my upcoming school stuff, and on blogging as well.

A quick summary of what will be coming up though:
Beneath the Branches of Zul'Aman
As requested: [ Roleplaying III ] : Character Template
Screenshot Worthy? [This one is still on the edge. Maybe, maybe not. We'll see.]

Forgive my busy-ness, and (hopefully) posts should be arriving before the end of this week.

Edit: Oh my, oh my, oh my, oh my, oh my! -falls out of her chair in shock- A former guild mate is in the blogging world! And found me! I think my heart skipped a beat! Now, if he'll blog about WoW is the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question! (I haven't talked to him in months, which is why I'm so utterly excited!)