Hey team, it’s certainly been a while. I’m back into the grind again. Actually, I managed to sign with a guild shortly after New Year’s. I found the guild on Facebook in one of the Warcraft recruiting groups which just happened to be on my server and their progression was close enough to where I left off. Personally, the name doesn’t do much to inspire me and it reminds me of some vanilla names, but the group seems friendly and focused enough.
It’s called… *whispers* <Ninja Pirate Monkeys>.
Like, how can a monkey be simultaneously a Ninja and a Pirate? It defies all guild naming conventions.
Let’s talk about the guild for a moment because this is the first time in maybe 10 years where I can be just a player. After about a solid month of retooling, we’re currently 1/10 Mythic in Nighthold! That’s not bad for a two-night, six hour guild (with optional raid nights during the week or weekend depending on who’s around). Then again, Mythic Skorpyron feels a tad easier than Heroic Gul’dan. The loot system’s handled using EP/GP which is new for me. Only loot system’s I’ve experienced before was loot council and DKP (way back in Burning Crusade) so this was an interesting change of pace for me. The nature of World Quest drops, Mythic Dungeons, and Titanforged puts less of an emphasis on raid gear because of the multiple avenues of gear sources. This has the added effect of allowing me to be much more selective on rewards that drop because I might not need an item if I have something close to it from a Mythic Dungeon, for example. Obviously, we can’t forget the lucky tactical usage of seals for extra rolls.
The healing corps at present consists of two Resto Druids, a Holy Priest (me), and a Paladin. I’m tempted to reinvest into Discipline because there’s times where I don’t seem to make a dent compared to the throughput capability of Resto Druids (but my AP’s only at 46 right now).
Every guild seems to have that one kryptonite class. You know, the one class where they can’t seem to recruit anyone for it or if that class does join, they leave within a week or two? In this case, that class seems to be Mages. I haven’t had anyone make food in ages. So yes, we’re recruiting.
One thing I’d like to see of is more structure. I do wish Angry Assignments were used more often for different bosses. Hell, I’d use it just for myself to write down notes for my own use but I can’t seem to edit it because I’m not a rank that has the permissions.
Nighthold Thoughts
How about some thoughts on Nighthold now that it’s been out for about 4 weeks? It’s nice to be in a non-dark, well-lit instance especially one that takes place in a part of a city. As for the overall difficulty of the instance, it seems to be just right. I haven’t progressed too far into Mythic yet so it’s difficult to say for certain how the rest of it is.
Skorpyron: Not that memorable. Your basic introductory boss. The mythic version is much more engaging with the coloured spikes and varied consequences of hiding behind different ones. A little dull for me to heal.
Chromatic Anomaly: Interesting change of pace especially with the slow time and fast time built in. Throws off my timing especially during slow time. Otherwise, straight forward and tolerable healing-wise.
Trilliax: It’s the beam phase. Go too fast one way and Trilliax can change directions and before you know it, a quarter of the rate is lightsaber’d in half with no chance of recovery. Thankfully, encounter itself seems to be forgiving. I like jumping on the Roombas before they detonate. Fun!
Aluriel: Fun to heal! Frost phase is the most tense for me just due to the number of things that can go wrong. Sometimes a person who just got a bomb collides with someone who had the bomb for much longer so the timing’s off. Ideally, I wish players with equal timings would run into each other instead.
Krosus: Also fun to heal. Nice sense of urgency applied with the gradual reduction in raid platform. Aside from the occasional player getting sniped from his beams, there’s a nice amount of damage that just gets thrown around with the slams.
Tichondrius: Challenging encounter. This isn’t one I look forward to at all. Always worried about missing the purple pool buffs because it seems to spawn on the green fire. Collisions can be scary especially if players just run in to detonate them before the raid is at a sustainable health level.
High Botanist Tel’arn: Fun to heal! Multi-phase fight means you need to keep track of different abilities that are occurring at different times. Slow buildup that crescendos into a chaos filled final phase.
Star Augur Etraeus: Actually, I really like the special effects and the background of the encounter with the different backdrops and skies. Visually stunning. I appreciate it more during moments where I can safely take a moment to look up. Though, those moments aren’t often
Grand Magistrix Elisande: More dependant on your DPS nailing the blue and red elementals at the right time to ensure that you have the necessary slows and buffs for the rings.
Gul’dan: One of the better end bosses I’ve experienced. Lots of awareness needed with the eyes. Placement matters so you don’t get thrown off the ledge. Reminds me of the ol’ Lich King encounter. The final phase and the dealing with the souls is one of the more tense parts of a fight I had to heal through. First phase is a little annoying though.
During one of the Elisande kills, I found myself with the Ephemeral Paradox trinket. It seems to only work on the following healing spells:
- Holy Priest: Heal
- Discipline Priest: Shadow Mend
- Holy Paladin: Holy Light
- Resto Druid: Healing Touch
- Resto Shaman: Healing Wave
- Mistweaver Monk: Effuse
Yeah, casting Heal for that mana return takes just way too much time. You have to make a calculated risk on whether that extra second on Heal is worth it. In a raid group with Resto Druids, by the time the heal lands, the Rejuvs will already have done their jobs. Any player with lower health (like 25% health) generally needs healing right now and Heal isn’t fast enough nor strong enough to get that wounded player back to a healthy level. In my opinion, for a regen trinket, it seems pretty weak. I just need to get lucky on a high Titanforged Amalgam’s Seventh Spine drop.
Feels off to be writing again. But, it’s like riding a bike.
EPGP is an interesting system. I think at this point I’ve raided with guilds that have used every well-known loot system except for SK. Especially with the additional loot sources as you mentioned, EPGP becomes particularly prone to abuse in my opinion as people may hoard for bis trinkets and such while farming flat stat upgrades elsewhere. _When done right_ loot council is still by far the best way to maximize the benefit to the raid but that can be a high bar to ask.
2 druids and a holy priest?! woof. Disc definitely complements that comp better (but I’m pretty much always biased towards disc.) In the end though, bring the player not the spec and all that – what does the heal officer/raid lead think?
Warlocks were our kryptonite for the longest time, but suddenly we’re swimming in locks and all of our mages have quit en masse. Not a bright time for mages I’m told, but still not as bad as the uproar over MM hunter changes a while back.
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I first came across your blog back in TBC as I was leveling my first priest alt. Over the years even as I took a long hiatus from WoW your blog posts were my one remaining connection to the game. Even if you don’t post *as* frequently now they are always interesting and informative, and you’ve written some great stuff on gamer psychology that continues to be very relevant. tl;dr you’re awesome, your blog is awesome, good luck with the new guild!
Every loot system has it’s own shortcomings and how it can be exploited, for sure. Loot Council often took time to figure out. With Legion and the Warforged, Titanforged, and sockets, it becomes even more of a cluster to sift through. So I do like EPGP in it’s expediency and at this stage of my raiding career anyway, I’m not as focused on obtaining every best in slot piece for every item anymore. Just give me enough stats where I’m not going to get two shot and enough healing power to do my job efficiently. That’s all anyone can ask.
The healing officer’s open to the idea of a Disc Priest. Alas, I’ve only 13 traits invested in Disc. And I figure I may as well max out Holy (at 49 traits now) and then switch over.
And whoa, Stormy, you’ve been reading almost as long as I’ve been writing o_O. Clearly I must write more so you can kill more time during the day.
If you have max AK getting your disc artifact to 35 should only take a day or two! Well worth the delay before maxing holy, imo – opens up the option of messing around with disc outside of main raid (or even during…) I certainly wouldn’t want to hard swap to another spec without first familiarizing myself with the playstyle at 34 traits. (To be fair, Light of Tu’ure is an actual button to press; most of disc’s traits are passive benefits.)
Still! If I were handed a priest toon with 35 in disc and 54 holy, I’d still opt to play disc, that’s how much love/faith I have for the spec. If your raid has an innervate up for grabs, you’re in for a fun time. 😀