heroic dungeons Archives - HuntsmansLodge.com

Talk About Close Calls!

March 25, 2009 By Garwulf 6 Comments

How’s this for an edge of your seat, nail-biter of a finish. This screenshot is from a 25 Man Sartharion 1D PuG I was in on last night.

The last Flame Wave took out a good portion of the raid, freeing the adds and dropping the MT. I watched in horror as Sartharion started one-shotting the six or so that were left, while only at about 175K.

175K…150K…125K…come on guys!…100K…75K…50K…oh no, it’s gonna be a wipe at .5%….25K…I can’t believe this!…12.5K…(gets ready to take the screenshot of the raid wiping with Sartharion at 2.5K health)…5K…2.5K…OMG!…DOWN!

Blackout should have gotten a “Last Man Standing” Achievement.

Now, let’s talk about how this fight sucks as a Hunter. I hate this fight, did I mention that?

I’ve never really taken the time to learn this encounter, so shame on me. I know I’m supposed to avoid the Flame Waves and Shadow Fissures, but I always seem to be getting knocked back or something right as a Flame wave hits. Also, I can never manage to keep my pet up for more than 50% of the fight.

I know I need to plan out my position and call my pet back while the Flame Waves are coming, but it always seems easier said than done. My first few times in here had gone really well, but ever since then I seem to fail at Flame Waves.

Ok, I’m off to TankSpot.com now to watch some Obsidian Sanctum videos.

BBL

Hunter Hit Cap Attained and Then Some

February 22, 2009 By Garwulf 2 Comments

After starting the week out at somewhere around a paltry 126 hit rating, I now have enough +hit on my gear to not only attain the cap, but to also re-gem if need be. With all of my new +hit blues and purples I am able to exceed the 263 hit rating (~8%) needed vs. bosses. Not only that, I’ve managed no less than 10 gear upgrades in the past week which is pretty solid I’d say. If you are LFM need 1 DPS, then G2G… I’m your man. 😉 I love the WotLK Dungeons.

Here’s a list of the loots I’ve gotten over the past week via one Malygos run, one Vaults run and an average of 2 heroics per night. Not too shabby me thinks.

Incisor Fragment – I’ve run heroic Drak’Tharon 3 times this past week and each time King Dred has dropped this trinket. It’s not bad, but I’d much rather have him give me his helm.
Pendant of the Outcast Hero – The first item I bought with my Emblems of Heroism.
Black Ice – Possibly my most favoritest 2h ever. BTW, check out the sexy Night Elf Hunter posing with this in the image on Wowhead. 😉
Dragon Slayer’s Sabatons – Really nice pre-raid Hunter boots.
Handgrips of the Savage Emissary – Good PvE improvement over my Swiftarrow Gauntlets.
Boots of the Neverending Path – Although they’re leather, these boots rock for Hunters. 66 hit rating, 51 agility and 122 attack power. I’m sporting these now over my Dragon Slayer’s Sabatons.
Heroes’ Cryptstalker Legguards – Easiest Dungeon set piece I’ve ever gotten. Dropped for me on a 10-man Vault of Archavon run that took all of about ten minutes. Why didn’t I start doing these sooner is what I’ve been asking myself..?!
Mirror of Truth – The second item I’ve purchased with Emblems of Heroism. And yes… it does proc off of ranged attacks… a lot. Definitely a fantastic Hunter trinket.
Mobius Band – Very nice stats for a Hunter. Drops off of Chrono-Lord Epoch in The Culling of Stratholme.
Hateful Gladiator’s Wristguards of Triumph – My only PvP-specific upgrade, but a decent one nonetheless.

Had I’d known earlier how fun the Dungeons were in Wrath of the Lich king I’d have been running them a lot sooner. I’m so accustomed to the pre-vanilla WoW days when a PuG heroic would sometimes mean a 3 hour wipefest only to end with someone going AWOL just before the final boss. Being the nice guy that I am, I always felt bad about leaving a group high and dry in a late-night instance so I’d ususally end up sticking with it until the eventual implosion. However, these new WotLK dungeons are extremely painless and very profitable compared to the old days.

I’m all about the LFG channel now. 🙂

Black Ice

February 17, 2009 By Garwulf 2 Comments

The bad news is our Naxxramas 10-man scheduled for last night didn’t happen. I was all dressed up with nowhere to go because we couldn’t assemble a full group. There were a couple last minute sign-up removals and our Fury Warrior, who’s a huge portion of our DPS, couldn’t miss his Monday night episodes of Wife Swap and Super Nanny. If there are any Tanks, Healers or even DPS reading this who are on the Kul Tiras server and looking for a good guild full of nice peeps, go to our website and submit an application. We need more bodies ASAP.

Although our Naxx run didn’t get off the ground, the night ended up getting a whole lot better for yours truly. I ran a couple of Heroics with a DK Tank from our guild and blew through Nexus and Violet Hold in record time. Keristrasza dropped Dragon Slayer’s Sabatons for me, so I was pretty happy about that. I threw a pair of Glinting Monarch Topazes in them to boost my dismal hit rating some. These were a very decent upgrade for me.

Now for the really good news… I received a tell from my former 2v2 partner asking if I’d like to join his guild for a 10-man Eye of Eternity run. Being that I was already chomping at the bit to raid last night, had a load of consumables on me and the fact that his guild happens to be the top Alliance raiding guild on my server, I jumped at the chance.

I felt pretty burly going into their raid, but their Survival Hunter quickly showed me what time it was. He topped the meters for the fight and absolutely destroyed me on DPS. I was impressed because although I’ve only done that raid one other time, it seems like it would be one of the more difficult runs for Hunters. There’s a ton of movement which hurts Hunters due to the lack of instant cast attacks, plus pet damage is a non-factor for much of the fight while Malygos and the other random mobs are flying around. Malygos’ gigantic hit box poses problems as well. I find I’m often having to leave the caster group to get range on him.

Anyhow, when it was all said and done, lo and behold guess what dropped..?! BLACK ICE. I’m such a noob I didn’t even really know about this weapon. I just started raiding again last week and I hadn’t inspected the loot tables past 10 man Naxx, which is where my guild is at the moment. The guys in < The Departed > were gracious enough to let me roll on it (but may be kicking themselves now). I rolled a 93 and beat their Hunter by 4 as I recall. I felt sort of bad, but quickly got over it. 😉 I don’t foresee upgrading this baby for awhile, so I threw Massacre on it.

So, as you can see, things have a way of working out. 🙂 The best part is, it’s better for me than the item I wanted most from Naxxramas last night, the Claymore of Ancient Power. I needed hit rating in a bad way. Last night’s upgrades gave me a whopping 88 additional hit after gems. This week’s mission will be to try and get my mitts on Sphere of Red Dragon’s Blood.

New Shinies

February 16, 2009 By Garwulf Leave a Comment

Now that I’m hooked on running Heroics, I managed to get a couple new items over the past few nights. First was the Incisor Fragment from King Dred in Heroic Drak’Tharon Keep, and the second item was Pendant of the Outcast Hero which I purchased with the Emblems of Heroism I’d amassed in the past week. The new neck was a pretty decent PvE upgrade over my Hateful Gladiator’s Pendant of Triumph, giving me an additional 45 AP and a decent amount of crit.

The trinket will be something interesting to play around with. I used it last night in two Heroic Dungeons, The Culling of Stratholme and Halls of Lightning, and it seemed to give me some pretty big numbers when I did. Tonight in Naxxramas I’m going to equip my Giantmaim pieces along with this and see how it goes. Another thing I’m toying around with is binding this trinket to Aspect of The Beast when using the Devilsaur. It seems like stacking Armor Penetration, casting Bestial Wrath, and Kill Command while popping this trinket, plus the added melee damage of Monstrous Bite would make for some Dino-style ass whoopin’.

What I could really use is a Hit Rating trinket. Sphere of Red Dragon’s Blood would be ideal until I could find something better. Maybe I can scare up some guildies to run Heroic Nexus after the Naxxramas raid. 😀

Well, here’s to hoping that the Four Horseman feel like giving me their Claymore of Ancient Power tonight. 🙂

My First Heroic in WotLK and Now Naxxramas Tonight!

February 12, 2009 By Garwulf 2 Comments

Last night I completed my first ever Heroic Dungeon in Wrath of the Lich King. In fact, the only new instances I’ve been in are The Nexus, Utgarde Pinnacle, Gundrak and one time I joined a Malygos 10 man. I don’t do too many dungeons these days as you can see, because most of my guild is ready to log by the time I can begin an instance, which is around 11pm-12am server time.

I typically only like to PuG if the group consists of at least 2 of my guildies. I’ve had some excellent random groups in the past, but I’ve had some equally miserable ones as well. So, I’ve left the instances alone and have just been mainly queueing for battlegrounds & some casual arena, taming & leveling pets, helping my wife level her 76 Rogue, and doing the occasional daily on Garwulf.

Last night I received a tell from one of my guildies asking if I wanted to come finish Heroic Utgarde Pinnacle. 9 times out of 10 I would have turned it down, but she caught me in the right mood, plus she’s a sweetie and I couldn’t refuse. We sailed through the last 2 bosses and I had a blast. I ended up continuing with the group into Heroic Gundrak for the daily. I ended the night with 9 Emblems of Heroism and 2 new pieces of gear.

I won the Meteroite Whetstone from King Ymiron and Helmet of the Shrine (I know… expertise, wtf? It’s for my melee set… yeah, that’s it) from Eck the Ferociuos. The helmet is actually the best PvE helm I have at the moment, even with the useless expertise on it. I’m just wondering if pet’s expertise scales at all with a Hunter’s. I’m thinking no, but that’d make it almost useful if it did. Regardless, I slapped an Arcanum of Torment on it and threw in a Chaotic Skyflare Diamond and Rigid Autumn’s Glow. Having the gem slots in that helm helps me a lot. My hit rating needs some love for sure.
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