WoW, what a weekend!
In many ways it was just another weekend, but in others it was awesome. What’s more it’s ended with a dilemma… and we all like a dilemma don’t we?
Where to begin… Maybe the beginning…
8 man OS+1
Ok, that didn’t happen, but we did try! …and try again, and again. We were close, but there was no Cuban cigar.
But, I get ahead of myself… Last time we hit OS, it was with similar intentions, but we were filled out to a 10 man with a couple of PuGs. We took down 2 drakes then failed a few times at the boss. The PuGs then exploded, told us what they thought of us and dropped group.
Of course we went on to finish the boss off after taking his mate down separately.
So this Friday, as we downed the 2nd drake down in preparation for our Boss+1 kill, we got a little unexpected joy.
Yep, as I tried to convince you last week, Less is More!
As I mentioned above we couldn’t 8 man Sarth+1, but we gave it a crack or 3 or 4.
Now this made me think. You know how it seems to be standard form for PuGs to request the linking of Fall of Naxx?
Next time I apply for a raid spot, I am going to link my 8 man achievements instead. After all, it not just proves I know the raid, but it shows I can pull my weight (as little as that may be). Surely that makes a 10 man achievement worth a 25 man achievement!
VoA
Wintergrasp was in the hands of the Alliance, so we trundled over to VoA. I ported in while my mates hoofed it. I hadn’t noticed until one of them was asking for assistance to summon.
I’m thinking, “I just ported them all to Dalaran, why do they need a summons?“. So just for the record folks, the portal to WG appears when the battle commences and remains if/while you hold Wintergrasp.
Don’t go the hard way, us Mages have a saying:
Better living through Portals.
Sure, chemicals may be more fun, but portals are quick and efficient.
Pugs
We decided we would need a couple more for Emalon, so we invited a couple of “PuGs”, guildies of my mates.
Emalon down, delivering 3 gifts… PvP pants for me, and a Mammoth for…
Mammoth
Needless to say we were excited, Vent erupted while the 8 of us fought over who would get it, but of course it came down to a roll.
I rolled … low… what’s new… but there were some high rolls… Guess who won…
Yep, one of the PuGs
Not just a PuG, but the ALT of the pugger… Lucky bar stool!
Just for the record… it wasn’t a Ninja roll… well, apart from the fact that he snuck up and rolled higher than the regulars…
Archavon went down with no dramas, so it was time to move on to a quarter or two of Naxx8.
Naxx9
One of our long term mates has been M.I.A. For about 9 months now. He was one of the 1st to start playing WoW, in fact purchased most of the copies of Vanilla WoW to get us hooked.
He has been teasing us for a while now with the possibility of joining us, even sent a message last week to say he would be online this week.
He is however notoriously unreliable (not in a bad way, just in a shit happens way), so after OS and VoA we were pretty sure we weren’t going to see him.
How sure… Archavon down and a few people in chat say:
Looks like Mr. H won’t be on tonight…
Yeah knew he wouldn’t be on…
[system] Mr. H has come online.
[system] Mr. H has joined the channel.
So began the unexpected Naxx9 run. Unexpected mainly as I thought Zupa would have been mate No. 9, but as he is solo tanking VoA on his other DK, we now don’t expect to see home for a while.
Mr. H is a Healadin, a level 70 gear wearing Healadin. Still even with Mr. Tree changing to Big Bird for the night, we still had 2.5 healer’s including Mr. H.
A week can be a long time in WoW, even though we 8 manned OS, and were still riding on the buzz of last weeks Naxx8, for some reason as the night went on we felt our chances of success were decreasing… Funny the way the mind works.
It wasn’t a fail night though, in fact it was quite successful.
Plate caster drop after plate caster drop we progressed through Naxx.
0 to 10 level 80 Epics in one run… his 1st instance in Northrend! That isn’t taking into account the ones he replaced during the run…
My DPS was in the high 2k to early 3k.. pretty much dependent on my Hot Streak proc, but I am happy (happier) now that I am off the low 2k bench.
I also now have my 1st ever 4 piece set bonus after picking up two pieces of Heroes Frostfire (or tokens for their purchase). In any of the fights where my job was to do pure DPS (No chasing zombies or saving mates from spidery death etc.)
I know questions re gear are usually innocent, but more often than not it’s who asks the question that defines whether you take offense or not.
On one of my (uncontested) rolls on loot I was pulled up by Mr. Offspec because surely I already had the item.
I assured him I did already have it, in fact I have multiples of it.
At which point everyone piped up to describe how they are all collecting multiple tokens.
Momma
We took a shot at Maexxna, all but one of us focused on her, and she went down. You know what they say…
Naxx was over, Mr. H went from all 70’s gear to sporting 10 level 80 epics including two T7 pieces and we are looking to the future… Ulduar!
The Ulduar Composition Delimma.
But now we have a dilemma with group composition, we have:
- Maintankadin come Retardin – our best geared tank. He also has a shadow priest which isn’t that well geared.
- Mr. WildTank… Is a tank, is a tank is a tank.
- Mr. Z! Top DPS rogue, has a healy Priest alt.
- Mr. Offspec enhancement shaman, 2nd best DPS
- Mr. Tree. Main Heals and Big Bird offspec.
- Mr. Me. Gnome Mage extraordinaire
- Mr. Gloom another Tree Druid with little used bear offspec
- Mr. Healadin. Naxx10 geared for healing but nothing else.
- Mr. H. Also a Healadin with 10 Naxx epics, the rest being level 70 gear.
So, that’s 2 tanks, 3 DPS (only one ranged), 4 healers.
On top of that we have had an offer from another Healadin! 5 Healers!
Mr Tree is looking for a break and is comfortable with the change to Big Bird, but even so I wonder how we will go with only 4 DPS…
In other news.
Northrend Gourmet
Thanks to a lucky run of Mustard Dogs, I picked up my final recipe, Fish Feast, cooked it up and I’m a Gourmet.
This was interesting timing as I had just finished watching the grand Final of MasterChef (with 4.3 million Aussies, 20% of the population, more than any other non-sport event). So I felt pretty chuffed as an amateur chef… Maybe Chef Gnomeaggedon soon…
Secret Spawn Spots
One of my frustrations with the cooking quests has been the disorderly line of toons fighting over the few spawn points. Don’t get me started on the rat race that is mushrooms in the sewers, but maybe I can help you with the mustard and wine glasses.
Mustard is a Bastard
Mustard seems to have 4 spawn points. The center and the Kirin’Tor tower gardens always seem to be camped, but the little garden near the north bank is always free on my server.
Wine Glasses 1/2 full
Likewise while both the Alliance and Horde inns are wine glass bitch fights, the Violet Hold area has 4 spawn points that no one seems to know about.
Dinner’s on the Gnome!
In one of my previous Gnome weekends I knocked up the 5 great feasts required for the battlegrounds. I decided it was time to sign up to all the battlegrounds, spawn, drop the feast and run.
Turns out you can only queue for 3 battlegrounds at a time, and can’t queue from within a battleground…
Anyway where was I?
Oh yeah,
- Into Arathi Basin, feast and out.
- Into Alterac Valley, feast and out
You must understand that I don’t normally BG hop. If I get in one I stay for better or worse, but tonight I don’t intend to stop…
- Into WSG, feast and …
Thank you!
What!?! Polite people…. Mmm I might hang around for a little bit.
I hung back on defense, after all nearly everyone else had charged out mid field. I was soon in the action, Lock and DK came for our flag, the battle was heated, 3 of us against 2 of them.
I could see our flag carrier was nearly back to our base… And I died…
One wrong move and I am in mid-field rather than racing back into the base… But wait, here comes the Horde Flag carrier through our grave yard…
Two casts later, our flag returned, their flag capped.
That was the end of the action for me, apart from cheering our flag carrier on two more times.
He even stopped to take a bow before the 3rd cap!
Yeah, shows you how much I have hit the BGs since achievements came out.. Still, gotta love the double achievement ding!
Detour to Drak’Tharon Keep
No sooner am I back in Dalaran than I get a random pst asking if I want to do Heroic Drak’Tharon Keep.
I don’t really want to, but I need to cover that achievement off, so sure.
Checked with my mates where it was, asked if there is anything I need to know…
Only that it’s easy!
Which it was until the Raptor boss. Our DK tank was new to the job, so the Gnome Lock and I were playing a constant game of either slow down to lose threat, or speed up and hope it dies 1st.
The second option had been working fine. I was pulling > 3.5k dps on boss fights?!?
The Raptor boss wasn’t playing ball though. At one point my Mirror Images were tanking because everyone else was carpeting the floor. I should have dodged that.
After 3 wipes we moved on, totaled the Bone boss then came back while the hunter swapped out for his Warrior tank.
At this point I would like to thank those guys there at the end, cause they were prepared to full clear to make sure everyone’s achievement needs were met. Cheers Smalletz, Medusah, Panfreya (& Therodance), Lunhillenn!
Speaking of which… One more down. Strangely enough PuGChecker shows me as having 3 clears… Not bad for my 1st run!
Back to the kitchen
So next stop was SotA It was a fail BG, but interesting as it was my 1st time through. I love the change sides concept. Just as I thought things were going well, the dinner tables were turned and we were taught a lesson.
Cooking up a Storm
One more BG for the achievement win, EotS.
I not only got thanked, but got cross server congrats for becoming the shortest Chef in the battlegroup.
So I had to hang around…
Popped Slow Fall, mounted up, rode, jumped…
Watched the crevasse in the middle of the BG slowly but surely fill my screen…
Man you can jump a long way…
Landed on the crevasse lip and headed straight off for enemy territory.
30 seconds later I’m giving the Horde a Chill Pill… I knew there was a reason to hang around…
Make that 2 reasons, and I’m not talking about the 2 rogues ganking us in the grave yard… Maybe they should have spent more time on the BG objectives, cause I got the BG honors, not them!
Beating the Horde off, one stick at a time.
I guess that should be it, but inspired by my Monty Python post the other day, I thought I’d go after the Black Knight, but first I had a score to settle with them Champions, especially the Horde Champions…
Every day I swear I won’t go back to Argent Tournament, but I keep getting sucked back… One in a blue moon anyway…
Rearing the Young
Speaking of things I swear I will never do again, I jumped on my young Shaman for a little while before the servers went into weekly shutdown mode.
I’ve been a Mage for a fair while now, and I am still not used to this whole “Let the mob come and hit you” game. Traditionally my objective is to wipe it out before it reaches my feet… but with the Shaman and it’s lightning shield, it’s all about getting hit…
Of course, I have elected to be Elemental rather than Enhancement… so maybe the mistake I am making is trying to play a Nature Mage.
But… slowly but surely, I am getting there…
One achievement down… and it’s a big one for a little Shaman like me… My Shaman has now got Talent!
That’s all for this week folks… More Naxx9 fun coming this weekend.
Gnomer and Out!
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http://gnomeaggedon.net/2009/07/22/gnome-weekend-that-was-momma-says-less-is-more/
You are missing a couple of spawn points that I check out for the mustard grass in Krasus’ Landing – amazingly enough despite the high traffic there I find that often nobody is out there looking for them.
Doh… Seems so obvious now you mention it!
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Yeah, I was going to mention Krasus’ Landing as well. Most people don’t go there to check for mustard, so there’s usually one or two plants sitting there. Plus, you turn in the quest there, so if you have the rhino meat, you can usually get your last mustard or two and turn in the quest really easily.
Grats chef gnome. The 2 outland reciepes won’t drop for me.
Took a while for the last couple to drop for me as well, but I couldn’t let Prelimar beat me to the title…
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wow, congratulations, chef! that’s a title i’m going for as well. i lack the battleground stuff, though, because i’m a PvP-phobe. i’ve been getting more comfortable with the idea, though, diving into wintergrasp in the past week or so. friends tell me not to sweat it, just go into the BG, drop the feast, and then GTFO, but that seems… well, rude. but i might get over that, too. i wants mah title and mah hat! >: )
i have the “mother said…” achievement, but it’s absolutely through no skill or talent of my own: i have a friend in a guild who is miles above me, skill-wise, and he got me in on the run with his guild. i have never even heard of it, actually, and when it dinged he wsp’d me and said, “bet there’s not many people in your guild with THAT one!” – and he was right. it was my first time in naxx!
BGs aren’t thy scary, and you always need one or two fail ones to get the layout, so go do some exploring. Or GTFO… Whichever suits your mood.
Momma is kind of a joke. I got the heroic one on my 1st night at 80… Thought I had screwed up… This one has taken a little longer just cause we were mixing achievements…
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You forgot the sewers! No mustard there, alas, but wine glasses spawn in the inn in the sewers, on the tables out front and in the little room to the side. Also, they spawn both downstairs and upstairs in the cheese shop and the legerdemain. 😉 But the sewers are often my best bet for glasses.
Sewers… Hadn’t thought of there, but they are “so out of the way”.
Cheese shop and ledgermans always seem camped, or empty. There are a few odd ones in other buildings, but I like VH. 4 spawnspots, all within visual range and little if any competition
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Whoa, grats on chef! That’s quite awesome.
Thank you
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