What a solid start to the week with the new raid and everything that comes with it. Both of my teams took and hit the ground harder than most. I’ve some quick notes about our progression followed by other thoughts. Wasn’t an entirely smooth week though with some server hiccups earlier in the week, but it hasn’t affected our weekend teams.
- Death Jesters exits the week at 1/8 Mythic and 6/8 Heroic. This was a strong opening start to our raid progression. There is so much damn trash in the instance that we resorted to using non-car mounts to get to each boss. We burned it all down real fast or died then resurrected with the trash resetting behind us. Our normal raid was cleared in 65 minutes from end to end. On heroic, we were able to push up to Mugzee before we simply ran out of time, but we also allotted some pulls for Mythic Vexie (which we felt was easier than Heroic Mugzee or Gallywix). They have since made some nerfs to Mugzee, so it should be substantially easier on this go around.
- On the other side, Last Call had some new faces and a slightly larger roster (including a new tank). We cleared 5/8 Heroic and ended up short 3% for One Armed Bandit before enrage. So far, the team seems to be working well but it needs a bit more polish. I feel a little more alone here at the leadership level, and I wish I had some more help with CD planning and other raid assignments. I originally recruited an Aug Evoker, who switched to an Ele Shaman, before settling on a Shadow Priest. It was definitely irritating to start because they were recruited to do one thing, and it impacted my recruiting strategy with the class changes, but he’s performed well since then. Speaking of recruiting, I’m looking to add a Warlock, a Windwalker, and a Balance Druid to help the team. If you know any, send us some!
- Illnesses did wash over the team slightly. One of our priests succumbed and could not raid on day one, which set us back, but I was able to pull a friend in to help heal and take over. I’m a bit annoyed about the at because I did insist that they rest earlier in the week and not stay up too late trying to do keys. We really need to coach players to take care of themselves or something. I can handle a few early days of missed keys, but grinding those keys at the cost of burning out of being able to raid is even worse in my mind.
- I don’t have any clearcut favourite bosses yet in the new raid, as most of them seem pretty fun. Stix took a bit of time for our team to get though but once the trash balls were figured out, it made it much easier. I’ve prepared the Last Call team as best as possible with video clips of key mechanics and how to respond to them along with raid plans, but there’s still a lack of awareness or preparation of how to respond to certain things. Even so, most of the team did their homework ahead of time, which affected our progress in a good way.
- The dungeon grind has been surprisingly much smoother. I timed my first 10+ key earlier this week. It feels nice early on to sit at the 6 to 8 key range and get Hero gear and gilded crests without having to fight to slam 8s to 10s.
- The ilvl gap between top to bottom in Last Call is quite wide, and I’ve been trying to help people with their keys at the lower range (in 6s and 7s) and teaching through all the mechanics (both bosses and trash pulls). I want to set these guys up for success so they don’t have to be as reliant on me or the other dungeon veterans.
Yup, this is an exciting week.