by Rhidach, 2 days ago
When I was first researching which fight to do first, Sindragosa of Putricide heroic, the choice I was given was if you trust your healers more, go Sindy, if you trust your raid's coordination more, go Put. The choice was obvious, haha.
And I need to say, once we buckled down in phase 3 and everyone committed to absolute focus during that time, vent was like listening to a symphony. The coordination was amazing. It was awesome hearing you guys coordinate "X on raid, Y on tank, Z is out!" and so on.
Our victory wasn't just hard won the healers, not by a long shot. DPS was incredible, to the point where we were pushing her by percents of dps we hadn't seen in previous weeks. It was obvious everyone found their footing. Additionally, discipline with debuffs was great, I didn't see many people fluctuating like maniacs (like we've seen in the past).
Tanks were sublime, as always. ...
This is a pretty incredible victory for the guild. We've moved from a ho-hum 9/12 placement to the venerable 10/12 number. And soon we'll be 11/12, and beginning our epic journey's end as we begin chipping away at Heroic Lich King.
I'm really proud of you guys. These last few weeks of blood, sweat, and tears paid off.
by Rhidach, 4 days ago
The second ES Olympics game was last night, and while seemingly quicker than the first dash we had from Orgrimmar to Everlook, this one boasted a far more spacious track. Contestants had to dash from the gates of Silvermoon to the zeppelin tower in Tirisfal, then hop an RNG Carriage to Grom'gol to continue their trek to the Dark Portal.
The first two zones of the race, Eversong and Ghostlands, didn't see much excitement other than some poor souls being used for target practice by wayward Lynxes. The name of the game here was human shields.
In EPL, the tone of the rest of the race was established, based on what routes everyone used to cross in WPL. Also, bats are bastards.
WPL was pretty breezy to get through, with the only danger being a few double bear and zombie-spider pincer points. Graveyards were plentiful though, which made it easier to corpse hop.
Tirisfal was hardly worth mentioning, aside from the necessity of lucking out on RNG with the zep. Bad timing could leave you stuck behind as others got a huge head start in STV.
Once actually in Stranglethorn, contestants had to run like hell from spear-tossing murlocs, baby tigers, and evil gorillas. Only by properly utilizing Antigen as a human shield could one pass through the road with minimal hassle.
Duskwood was the land of guard packs and evil wolves, yet didn't pose too much trouble thanks to (again) plentiful graveyards.
Deadwind Pass was like a pre-victory lap. Swamp of Sorrows much the same.
Blasted Lands only had three really dangerous spots, and by the time many of us had crossed Deadwind Pass, the race entered its final phase between the jockeying of Weriik (winner of the previous contest), Cendra, Freezedealer, and Vili.
Eventually Weriik prevailed and took a very unofficial first place, but was of course disqualified due to a prior win. There will always be an asterisk next to this one.
Cendra took the real first place, followed closely by Vili, and then Freezedealer to round out third place.
Meanwhile, Falowin just managed to scrape his way out of EPL.
Congratulations to the winners, and many thanks for all that participated!
by Rhidach, 6 days agoSo Monday we're going to do another lvl 1 alt race, which basically entails rolling a new level 1 character (with no gear/enchants/pots allowed!) and running like hell for the end destinations while racking up an ungodly amount of deaths.
Last time we did from the gates of Orgrimmar to Everlook, which was intense. This time time I think we should do a bit longer of a track--the gates of Silvermoon to the Dark Portal (by way of Booty Bay).
We're starting at 7 server time and we'll conclude when someone reaches the end point. I'm debating door prizes and some additional monetary prizes (like most deaths, highest level at end) since it's also the guild's 2nd birthday.
by Rhidach, 21 days agoI finally did something I've been intending to do for a month now, completely reorganize the guild ranks. The new ranks are as follows:
1&2. Co-Guild Leads: GM Rank + 2 Co-Leads
3. Officers
4. Raiders: Everyone who is ready for ICC25 and actively raids
5. Social Members: People who don't raid but are established members
6. Officer Alts
7. Alts
8. Trial Members: People who have recently been invited and will sit in this rank for 2 weeks before being promoted to Raider or Social depending on what they were invited for.
9. JI/NN/WH: Stands for "Just Invited/Needs Note/(or) Was Hacked". A catch-all dump rank for newly invited people before an officer slaps a note on them and bumps them to Trial. There are no permissions for this rank, so hacked folks cool their heels in here.
I think it looks funny to have officer alts so low in the totem pole, but that's purely functional. Now when doing mass invites for events just select rank 5 and higher and you'll catch every main in the guild that isn't a Trial member.
Next on my to-do list is write a post about the future of the guild moving into Cata (short answer: we're staying a 25s guild) and answer questions people have been whispering me about the next xpac, and then my biggest project: look into redesigning/prettying up the guild site.
by Rhidach, 30 days ago
Guild first Shadowmourne! We've been working on this since May 11th, so a long time coming.
Here's hoping Morvain's luck is much better and we finish up #2 post haste.
As for the ES Olympics: Game #1 is scheduled for Thursday, August 19th at 7pm server time. Open to all guild members, and the winner gets their choice of three of the vanity items from the Shadowmourne quest:
[Muradin's Favor]
[Jaina's Locket]
[Sylvanas's Music Box]
The first game will be
Hunt the Guild Leader. I'm going to make a level 1 Alliance alt with a name you won't know in advance, but you'll know it when you see it, and hide somewhere, flagged, in a beginning Alliance zone. Whoever finds and kills me first gets their choice of prize.
Happy hunting!
by Rhidach, 38 days ago
Amazing job last night guys on LDW. You downed one of the hardest fights in the game, with generally little trouble (yes, I would call 5 attempts "little"!). We went in the course of an hour from having issues on one of the deadliest aspects of the fight--the ghosts--to handling them deftly and avoiding any major explosions with amazing speed.
We've accomplished something that few other guilds have been able to do, and downed a very dangerous boss. With this latest notch on our belt, we can begin looking to the near future, filled with oozes and frost bomb one-shots, haha. Now it gets interesting!
