Matticus

Matticus is the founder of World of Matticus, a World of Warcraft blog.

Matt’s Notebook: 5/8 Mythic with Fractilus Cleared!

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Another eventful week, and I expect things will slow up a bit from here on out. This might be the fastest we’ve progressed through a tier so far.

  • Death Jesters polishes off Fractillus. Big throughput and damage heavy boss from what I’ve seen. Lots of positioning is required, and having assigned zones and areas for players to stand in. It looks real fun and I can’t wait to take a crack at it.
  • Now we backtrack and start working on Soul Hunters. I drew back into the lineup here (from four to five healers). Our best attempt was getting them down to 3%. There was so much going on with the extra third dispel. Another week of gear and we’ll be in a good position to clear it this week. It’s really fun once we get through the overall cadence.
  • Over in Last Call, we’ve added two new healers to the squad and their first week has been productive overall. We did get through our reclear. I was hoping we could cut through Loom’ithar but our best pull was 12% remaining. We’re short damage right now more than anything else. I felt our damage on the incoming walls was inconsistent. There were times when they went down fast, and other times it felt like it went slow. We’ll have to take a look at that. Our phase 2 positioning and placement took a bit of time to get comfortable with.
  • Unfortunately, that level of progress wasn’t enough and one of our tanks decided to just leave. So now I’ve got to spend my next week looking for a tank to add to the team long term. It’s funny since I also am looking for a long term tank for DJs as one of ours is looking to step away from the tanking role as well.

No rest for the weary this week, sadly.

Matt’s Notebook: 4/8 Mythic with Forgeweaver Cleared!

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This post got off to a late start this week. Largely because much of my time was spent on recruiting and interviewing players. It’s also the first week of classes, so I’ve had to deal with that for work.

  • After a soul-crushing wipe with 6 million health left on Forgeweaver, we managed to clear it in Death Jesters about an hour later after that fateful wipe. Lots of coordination required here, including DPS placement to really maximize that multi-target damage. The next step is Fractillus before we drop back to Soul Hunters. Looks like I’m drawing into the lineup for Soul Hunters. I’l have to start looking into that one closer as it seems to be more of an endurance encounter than anything else.
  • Over in Last Call, we’ve passed a few trials and also released a few trials. We’re onto the next round of new players with the addition of two healers to help bolster our healing room. I wasn’t exactly happy during our first night on Plexus Sentinel. An hour later, with slow progress, I really wanted to get it down, and we went from 4 healers to 5 healers to really work on keeping the raid healthy. It took a bit longer as a result to get shields down and everything. Then we moved on up to Soulbinder and were able to clear that within a few pulls. I forgot to update our raid plan maps so our placements were slightly off, and I had to run the team through it real quick. Last thing I want to add is a Paladin who can play both Ret and Holy.
  • This week, our goal is to clear Loom’ithar and get some pull info on Forgeweaver. I worry we’re going to reach my limits when it comes to the planning of CDs, groups, and CC usages. I might need to get some additional help with it here.

Let’s have a great week!

Trading Time for Gear: Why Our Raid Is Pivoting to Heroic Progression

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In both Death Jesters and Last Call, we’ve been progressing through Normal and Heroic Manaforge Omega since the start of the season, and we’re officially hitting that crossroad every raid team eventually reaches: Do we keep farming Normal for loot? Or pivot fully into Heroic, even if it means some players are missing pieces?

In DJs, we’re still continuing to certain normal bosses (not a full clear). If we really wanted to, all of normal can get cleaned out in 45 minutes. We actually need that gear to help us on Mythic Forgeweaver and onwards.

In Last Call, the answer is crystal: Time matters more to us than gear. We’re not at the point where our gear is impeding our progress.

Making the Shift

It’s tempting to keep clearing Normal every week just to get that one trinket, that one weapon, or the last few tier pieces. In Last Call, we only raid six hours per week. Our biggest bottleneck right now isn’t item level. Our bottleneck is time spent seeing, pulling, and learning bosses.

While other teams can double-dip and run full clears across multiple nights, we don’t have that luxury. Every hour we spend reclearing Normal is an hour we’re not progressing on Heroic, or practicing mechanics that we’ll eventually need to execute cleanly on Mythic.

We benefit more as a team by:

  • Pulling Heroic bosses more often
  • Learning encounter pacing and clean transitions
  • Practicing cooldown timing, and both positioning and movement consistency
  • Giving raiders more time to develop confidence and reps

Addressing the Gear Gap

It’s true that some raiders still have gaps in their gear like a missing tier piece, a low-stat trinket, a weaker weapon. But we’re not losing fights due to gear. We’re losing because of missed interrupts, poor positioning, or phase transitions that could be smoother with more reps. Sometimes we applied cooldowns in the wrong area when we needed them in some other stage of an encounter.

There are other gearing methods:

  • Mythic+ is fully available between crests, vault rewards, and hero track gear upgrades.
  • Players can run Normal in pugs or our open community runs if they still need specific pieces.
  • Crafted gear and sparks are already in play.
  • Champion-level gear can now be upgraded fairly easily via dungeons and crest farming.

The raid doesn’t need to carry this load. Each raider can take charge of their own gearing path while the team focuses on progression.

Informing the Team

I know that not everyone’s going to agree with the approach. Some players will feel left behind if they’re still missing key gear. It’s important to frame this as a strategic team decision, not a punishment.

Here’s how we’re approaching it:

  • Clear communication ahead of time — not the day of the raid. This gives everyone the time to run it on their own.
  • Outline the why: More reps lead to more kills. We’re no longer wiping to damage.

Some players will be frustrated. That’s okay. But the path forward needs to be clear, and the longer we delay that pivot, the longer it’ll take to reach our full potential.

A Final Reflection

In the last Notebook post, I mentioned that Last Call reached Phase 3 on Dimensius several times. We didn’t kill it because we lacked gear. We just needed a little more time.

That’s what this is all about! I have to maximize the time we have to give ourselves the best possible shot. We’re trying to hit Cutting Edge, and that takes reps, not just gear.

If there’s still certain pieces that are needed, it’s time to pray or make a generous donation to the vault gods!

Not All Progress Feels Like Moving Forward

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Today’s post has nothing to do with WoW. There are no raid pointers, strategy, drama, or healing optimization. I wanted to sit down and put some thoughts on paper, and there’s no better place than the void to do so.

If you’ve been reading my blog for a while (what’re you doing here anyway?), you’ll know that I’ve been playing in a community orchestra for the better part of eight years. I show up to weekly rehearsals and perform once every four months in a large auditorium to perform pops stuff (movie music, Disney, Broadway, etc). I’m not a first violin player. Those are the ones that play the more interesting melodies. I’ve always felt more at home in the second violin section, which largely adds the harmony or other elements. The job there is to support and be reliable. Not a lot of glory, but that’s all I’ve wanted.

The orchestra leadership has recently decided to restructure. The group’s been split into different ensembles based on skill levels, and I’m in the lower level (or junior) group. I get it. It makes sense. I never had that training when I was younger. I started from scratch in my late 20s, and pairing with kids now who are a third my age who may as well be prodigies or something. I still have a lot of technical growing to do. During concerts, I would play 2 or 3 pieces out of a repertoire list of maybe 7. I’d be playing from the rear in the 6th row behind the more advanced players. It would be a safe and sheltered environment.

With this split, I’m much more exposed.

The group of players I used to rehearse with, which included violinists, violists, and cellists, would share growing pains together as we laughed and shared frustrations about what we were struggling with from our concert repertoire. Sometimes we’d hang out with each other outside of rehearsal, just trying to drill specific measures or work on listening and cuing based on our parts. That’s gone now. They’ve either advanced upwards or departed entirely. The ones that stayed get to work on cool movie, anime, and game scores. I’ve been left behind with a few other musicians I barely know, spread out across generational gaps that I struggle to bridge.

I’m still showing up, and I haven’t missed a rehearsal so far. Yes, my motivation is completely shot. Discipline is the primary reason that I’ve stuck to this schedule. That’s a little scary, right?

I don’t know what I’m working towards anymore. That goal has evaporated.

When that support structure is gone, and those friendly, familiar faces aren’t there to share the grind with you, those hard questions and realizations start to surface. I’ve been left behind and abandoned. Is my progression just not fast enough? Is the effort not there? Even though I have a teacher from whom I’m taking weekly lessons, maybe it’s not enough. I’m more surprised that I didn’t even get so much as a shoulder tap.

Rationally, I’m sure people are busy. I’m sure there was no intent to exclude or abandon. I miss my friends more than anything.

This new structured setup has put me in an unfamiliar setting. For once, I’m not buried in the back anymore. I don’t have a wall of stronger players to shield me. I have to sit in that front row under that spotlight, sweating like crazy. That level of visibility is absolutely terrifying, even though it’s challenging me to figure out what I really want out of this hobby.

I know I don’t want to be a soloist. I know I don’t want to be a first chair or a section leader. All I really want to be is a decent, competent second violinist. That’s it.

Outside of orchestra rep, I just want to be able to play Bach’s Double. I don’t really need it in me to play for anyone. I just want to be the type of musician who can play it with certainty and confidence without any technical errors. Style and musicality errors can always be fixed later.

This realization does reframe a few things. I don’t need to measure my musical value by who my stand partner is or the number of pieces I can perform. Even though I can audition for music I’m not enthusiastic about, I don’t need to chase it. I can still practice for my own sake without the pressure of the orchestra’s skill rubric.

No one told me this, but staying pat can be harder than moving up (just like in Blackjack). Being out front under the glare of lights can be way scarier than hiding.

The road my friends and I shared to get here was fun and memorable, but this is where our roads diverge. Maybe I’m exactly where I need to be for now.

Matt’s Notebook: 3/8 Mythic in DJs!

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Productive week 2 for both of my teams. It’s also been crazy hot outside, and I’ve just been raiding in sauna-like conditions.

  • Death Jesters crushes three mythic bosses this week. Loom’ithar took a bit longer as we were wrestling with the final phase. I was surprised at the simplicity of both Plexus and Soulbinder. They didn’t take us more than a couple of pulls each.
  • DJs is looking to add another ranged DPS. We tried out a new Death Knight last week, but we just have too much in melee right now that it makes it difficult to add anymore melee classes into the roster.
  • In Last Call we made some great strides. We cleared our previous week’s progression in a day, which gave us more time to work on Nexus King and Dimensius. Nexus King Saladbar took us extra shots, and I had to readjust our placements of the stars.
  • We’re still trying to optimize our timing when it comes to loot distribution. We used to loot as we go, but some items took up more discussion than others, which led to dead time while waiting. Then we tried a different method where we would scoop up all the heroic loot drops and hold it until there were about 20 minutes left in the raid before distributing it then. That still took us around 30 minutes. This is a process that should get faster over time. I prefer this method of waiting to the end because, realistically, we don’t need that loot to help us kill the first six bosses. Plus, knowing the entire pool of drops available, we can make a more educated decision when it comes to completing set bonuses (especially with non-set pieces and catalyst charges), distributing trinkets, and pairing any weapon and trinket combinations together.
  • We did not have a good on Dimensius progression. We saw Phase 3 a handful of times, but didn’t really get enough pulls into it. We had one really healthy pull with almost everyone alive (one of our Evokers was dead), but we seemed to have rotted out mostly in phase 3 due to a handful of positioning issues, such as players not playing the rings properly, or getting dragged through Dimensius (or a Black Hole).
  • The biggest factor that stood out to me was that I felt our healing wasn’t where it needed to be. A few struggles were had in phase one just keeping the different sides alive. I had to ask one of our DPS players to switch to a healing role to help stabilize it. I just knew we were going to lose a healer somewhere between phase 2 and 3, and this was my way to hedge and keep an extra healer around. I think last night definitely exposed our healers significantly. I need to look at moving them around (I had two on one side, and three on the other, and it was the side with three healers that seemed to struggle with deaths). I’ve got to find another one to add. I am not happy about that, and I need to find a way to fix it.
  • I could have done a better job of trimming the raid size to make it easier. 5 healers with 25 players might’ve been too much of a stretch, and our bottom-end damage was too low. This would’ve helped accelerate our Nexus King and Dimensius progression. I ended up dropping one DPS player and switching another to healing, but that might’ve been too little too late. I actually lost some sleep over this, as I kept second-guessing my decisions after the raid last night, knowing it cost us a week, ahead of the Curve. I have to be more aggressive with raid size trimming, especially if I feel it’s going to help us progress. It sucks for the players who get sat. I’ve been there, and it’s an awful feeling, but it just makes the fight easier for reclears on the following week. Instead, I tried to do the “right” thing by hoping for a team victory with everyone involved and it was insurmountable. Even in DJs on our first AotC week, we ended up sitting some of our helpers and weaker players to get Dimensius. Now, though, we have a 3% buff entering this week, plus assorted upgrades from the vault, and a Catalyst token.
  • Is it time to take Normal off the rotation? It seems like the upgrades there are getting fewer. It takes us about an hour to cut through normal. I’m of the opinion that the hour is better spent on learning and on progression because while the gear upgrades help, the repetitions on the boss are much more valuable.

Still a lot of work to do for this week. Good luck in your vaults!