Enjoy!
Friday, January 30, 2009
Photoage and Spec-Listing
I took a quick screenshot so I can better document things for myself. The 5v5s is on the first page of Tichondrius, :) Sadly, I didn't catch a shot when we were at our peak last night (1906 or 1916 I think?), but this is close. ^_^
I also put a listing of my 4 Primary PvP Specs at the Bottom of Q5 Here.
Still waiting on the render of the new video, arg! it's been compiling for an hour and a half now and I have 3v3s soon, nuuuu!
I also put a listing of my 4 Primary PvP Specs at the Bottom of Q5 Here.
Still waiting on the render of the new video, arg! it's been compiling for an hour and a half now and I have 3v3s soon, nuuuu!
Juggling Arenas
It seems like I've been trying to cram a lot in before I head out of town for the weekend, but it's gone well so far. I scheduled 5s for yesterday (which went well), 3s tonight, and more 5s on Monday. This probably means I won't have time to run 2s this week, but ah well: there's always next week!
Last night went really well. Aside from a momentary personality conflict between teammates (which happens now and then on all teams, especially driven ones), everything went well on the whole. We didn't end at our peak for the night (I think we pushed ourselves too hard, which I will be more careful about in the future, and is part of the reason why tonight is a "light 3s night."
At our Peak, our humble 5v5s on its second week, hit #35 on all of US-Bloodlust (BG9), and #10 on US-Tichondrius, with an 87-17 Win / Loss Ratio (84%), which is ~incredibly~ impressive, and I am so very proud of my teammates. :) I honestly wasn't expecting us to do so well, but I remembered to turn on FRAPs for a few matches and decided it was high time to put together a video. I probably spent a bit too much time on it today, but it was a nice bit of stress-therapy, and I'm hoping to render it and hopefully upload it before 3s tonight. If not, I'll have to compile it after. I know my partners probably have some amazing saves on their end, but it's damned hard to show that sort of thing from my end, so instead I tried to explain what we were doing as a whole and what I, more specifically, was doing throughout the matches. I can't hit every note, but I did try to hit quite a few.
More to follow. :)
Last night went really well. Aside from a momentary personality conflict between teammates (which happens now and then on all teams, especially driven ones), everything went well on the whole. We didn't end at our peak for the night (I think we pushed ourselves too hard, which I will be more careful about in the future, and is part of the reason why tonight is a "light 3s night."
At our Peak, our humble 5v5s on its second week, hit #35 on all of US-Bloodlust (BG9), and #10 on US-Tichondrius, with an 87-17 Win / Loss Ratio (84%), which is ~incredibly~ impressive, and I am so very proud of my teammates. :) I honestly wasn't expecting us to do so well, but I remembered to turn on FRAPs for a few matches and decided it was high time to put together a video. I probably spent a bit too much time on it today, but it was a nice bit of stress-therapy, and I'm hoping to render it and hopefully upload it before 3s tonight. If not, I'll have to compile it after. I know my partners probably have some amazing saves on their end, but it's damned hard to show that sort of thing from my end, so instead I tried to explain what we were doing as a whole and what I, more specifically, was doing throughout the matches. I can't hit every note, but I did try to hit quite a few.
More to follow. :)
Thursday, January 29, 2009
An Epic "Evo Raid"
Someone from Evolution posted this as "this reminds me of an Evo raid."
Good story. :)
http://elitistjerks.com/blogs/deenogger/169-suprised_tank.html
Last night we had our own moment of "WTF" during a raid, namely, during Phase 2 of Malygos-25, you know, the phase where Malygos is flying around watching his Mages "pewpew" us from hover discs while we all run around dodging deep breaths in bubbles?
Yeah, during that phase, Malygos randomly decided to join the fight.
Yeah, you heard me right.
http://www.dreamspirit-studios.com/images/WoWScrnShot_012809_205802.jpg
Even Perc's expert kiting couldn't save us.
http://www.dreamspirit-studios.com/images/WoWScrnShot_012809_205842.jpg
Good times. :) I still say it was Malygos foiling our 6-minute attempt. ;)
Good story. :)
http://elitistjerks.com/blogs/deenogger/169-suprised_tank.html
Last night we had our own moment of "WTF" during a raid, namely, during Phase 2 of Malygos-25, you know, the phase where Malygos is flying around watching his Mages "pewpew" us from hover discs while we all run around dodging deep breaths in bubbles?
Yeah, during that phase, Malygos randomly decided to join the fight.
Yeah, you heard me right.
http://www.dreamspirit-studios.com/images/WoWScrnShot_012809_205802.jpg
Even Perc's expert kiting couldn't save us.
http://www.dreamspirit-studios.com/images/WoWScrnShot_012809_205842.jpg
Good times. :) I still say it was Malygos foiling our 6-minute attempt. ;)
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Huzzah!
Huzzah! :D
Hopefully we can keep up the pace and keep on trucking. :)
1.) We're in the top 100, yay!
2.) PR is fucked up like whoa.
3.) WHY IS MY PR LOWER THAN EVERYONE ELSE'S NO MATTER WHAT AHHHHH!?
4.) <3
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
5v5s, FigurePrint, and Such
Yesterday was the first day I managed to wrangle together a team for Season 5. I really hadn't done 5s since Season 4, since it seems they are tricky to not only find, but to find ones that are stable, skilled, and high on communication. One of the few I tried earlier this season was just some Mage inviting and knocking people off the team as he pleased (I'm sorry, but if I play 40+ games on a team in a week, I expect others to be kind and let me get points for the week on that team, but I digress... if people are going to be silly and boot you once just because, don't give them a second chance).
But honestly: I've been missing 5s a lot. 3s and 5s are some of my favorite brackets because of the skill and coordination it involves from everyone, and because it's not a juggle of rock, paper, scissors like 2s.
Making 5s happen however.... is another feat. Even one of my more solid 5s had issues in Season 3 since all five of us were in different guilds, with different raiding schedules, leading us into the whole "well, so and so will be 2 hours late, should we cancel or use a backup?" This, in turn, meant that most weeks we had 3-4 of the same folks, and then a few revolving spots, which simply isn't good for coordinated play. :-/
Part of the reason I came to Tich, however, was to be more active/competitive in 3s and 5s. Due to my own enjoyment of raiding, however, I've ended up with PvE oriented guilds (once again >_>), but with a few players in our ranks that really do love PvP, so I've been gravitating towards playing with them. I'm not sure how much "competitive" play is possible, but I'm hopeful. :)
3s this week went well, as I said, and yesterday I tried to wrangle together a 5s team, based around two things, mostly: 1.) People in the guild whose classes seemed to mesh/seemed skilled/seemed geared or trying to gear, and 2.) I wanted to play a DPS role in 5s. It seems at this point 2s could go either way, 3s I am a healer, and 5s, well, I wanted to find a way to try to make it work.
The comp I created was thus:
1.) Unholy/Frost DK
2.) Survival Hunter
3.) Holy Paladin
4.) Resto Shaman
5.) Heavy Balance Druid (me)
The thought being that with no Rogue or Mage, That I would need to be a mix of Range DPS/CC/Emergency Healing. It's certainly not a "cookie cutter" mix, and I haven't seen anyone else running it, but I figured it was worth a try, and if nothing else, since we're all from the same guild, hopefully we can get some more regular playtime in (and maybe use the 5s for points/rating for some that are lacking other teams).
Instead, we went 37 and 6, straight up to 1775 before the servers came down for maintenance, putting us at -exactly- #100 on all of BG9. :) I really wonder what that would have been if we weren't getting +2 to +5 per game won.... (The 3v3s calced at #168).
Oh, and we all got "Hot Streak" on our final game of the night! *laughs*
I am REALLY pleased with how things went. I was really proud of my teammates and I pulling off some really smooth 2345 and cold switches, and I really didn't feel even for our loses that we were out comped, we just were out played/out RNGed. That gives me a lot of hope that we will continue to improve and push on, which makes me excited as hell. It'd been awhile since I was the one making calls in 5s (my old competitive 5s was notorious for having two "alpha dog" male personalities that often clashed which lead to arguing between them >_>). It was all awesome to see people listening and assisting, peeling, CCing, switching, the whole deal. It just felt really, really incredibly solid for a first night, so I guess I might end up FRAPsing some 5s as well this week if I remember. :) Organized chaos can be so much -fun- with great comrades.
I am just pleased as punch to be playing all 3 specs in my brackets! Particularly for 3s and 5s I wanted to be in two separate roles, and I think one of my strengths is being a Hybrid, and playing as such, so Balance is -perfect- for me for 5s due to its situational versitility (and I can be more aware of calling switches, peril, etc.). Making calls as a healer is a lot more difficult in my own experience in 5s since it is so fast-paced. I am just even more thrilled the comp I formed and personalities therein seemed to work so well. Huzzah!
Happy day. :)
I also got my FigurePrint in the mail of Dreamspirit yesterday, in her Full Season 3 glory! I will have to take some photos later, but it turned out really well. That will always be a special season for me because it was the first time I hit 2k+ (and as such, was one of only 4 druids on Proudmoore with "shoulders").
Back to work!
But honestly: I've been missing 5s a lot. 3s and 5s are some of my favorite brackets because of the skill and coordination it involves from everyone, and because it's not a juggle of rock, paper, scissors like 2s.
Making 5s happen however.... is another feat. Even one of my more solid 5s had issues in Season 3 since all five of us were in different guilds, with different raiding schedules, leading us into the whole "well, so and so will be 2 hours late, should we cancel or use a backup?" This, in turn, meant that most weeks we had 3-4 of the same folks, and then a few revolving spots, which simply isn't good for coordinated play. :-/
Part of the reason I came to Tich, however, was to be more active/competitive in 3s and 5s. Due to my own enjoyment of raiding, however, I've ended up with PvE oriented guilds (once again >_>), but with a few players in our ranks that really do love PvP, so I've been gravitating towards playing with them. I'm not sure how much "competitive" play is possible, but I'm hopeful. :)
3s this week went well, as I said, and yesterday I tried to wrangle together a 5s team, based around two things, mostly: 1.) People in the guild whose classes seemed to mesh/seemed skilled/seemed geared or trying to gear, and 2.) I wanted to play a DPS role in 5s. It seems at this point 2s could go either way, 3s I am a healer, and 5s, well, I wanted to find a way to try to make it work.
The comp I created was thus:
1.) Unholy/Frost DK
2.) Survival Hunter
3.) Holy Paladin
4.) Resto Shaman
5.) Heavy Balance Druid (me)
The thought being that with no Rogue or Mage, That I would need to be a mix of Range DPS/CC/Emergency Healing. It's certainly not a "cookie cutter" mix, and I haven't seen anyone else running it, but I figured it was worth a try, and if nothing else, since we're all from the same guild, hopefully we can get some more regular playtime in (and maybe use the 5s for points/rating for some that are lacking other teams).
Instead, we went 37 and 6, straight up to 1775 before the servers came down for maintenance, putting us at -exactly- #100 on all of BG9. :) I really wonder what that would have been if we weren't getting +2 to +5 per game won.... (The 3v3s calced at #168).
Oh, and we all got "Hot Streak" on our final game of the night! *laughs*
I am REALLY pleased with how things went. I was really proud of my teammates and I pulling off some really smooth 2345 and cold switches, and I really didn't feel even for our loses that we were out comped, we just were out played/out RNGed. That gives me a lot of hope that we will continue to improve and push on, which makes me excited as hell. It'd been awhile since I was the one making calls in 5s (my old competitive 5s was notorious for having two "alpha dog" male personalities that often clashed which lead to arguing between them >_>). It was all awesome to see people listening and assisting, peeling, CCing, switching, the whole deal. It just felt really, really incredibly solid for a first night, so I guess I might end up FRAPsing some 5s as well this week if I remember. :) Organized chaos can be so much -fun- with great comrades.
I am just pleased as punch to be playing all 3 specs in my brackets! Particularly for 3s and 5s I wanted to be in two separate roles, and I think one of my strengths is being a Hybrid, and playing as such, so Balance is -perfect- for me for 5s due to its situational versitility (and I can be more aware of calling switches, peril, etc.). Making calls as a healer is a lot more difficult in my own experience in 5s since it is so fast-paced. I am just even more thrilled the comp I formed and personalities therein seemed to work so well. Huzzah!
Happy day. :)
I also got my FigurePrint in the mail of Dreamspirit yesterday, in her Full Season 3 glory! I will have to take some photos later, but it turned out really well. That will always be a special season for me because it was the first time I hit 2k+ (and as such, was one of only 4 druids on Proudmoore with "shoulders").
Back to work!
Monday, January 26, 2009
Post - 3.0.8
Well, the last week has certainly been a busy one. I think I was one of the few PvPers I know that opted out of "taking advantage" of the Arena-Bug that suddenly skyrocketed some teams to inordinately high numbers just because, well, I didn't see a point. Something in the match was obviously broken, and 1600s teams suddenly being at 2800s? .... No.
A lot "broken" here and there with the patch as well. A friendly hunter FDing, will sometimes drop my target (@$&@$), which reminds me of the old days of WoW when this was how it was in Season 1 and part of Season 2. Shadowmeld seems to not be "working" either, with a sort of built-in lag preventing Shadowmeld --> Swift Flight Form, and a lack of dropping combat in some PvE Encounters and Bosses as well, not to mention a sudden lack of PvP use. :-/ With the right timing, I could feign off an incoming cast, or read as "immune" to a single enemy player spell if I cast Shadowmeld at the right moment during their cast, but.... no more. I don't even know what direction this is headed: if it's a nerf, or a glitch, but it certainly does make my racial poor at the moment.
This week's Arena, when I finally -did- run it over the weekend was a polite mixed-bag. Twos were solid, and then we made the mistake of playing too long (read: into the wee morning hours), and tanking our rating. There's always next week, though. Moreover I'm still iffy about the new system, which basically is not a "zero sum" calculation. Mostly we were winning say, 5-7 points for a win, and the losing team was losing about 4-6 on average. To some extent this gives people that throw themselves into Arena a little pat on the back because you have to steadily chug along to move up, and the slip-ups aren't as soul-crushing (27-29 point losses can HURT), but it still takes a darn lot longer to go anywhere.
Sunday-Night threes, at least, went a lot better and more than made up for 2s. I think I've tried ever spec imaginable and every playstyle to boot to make an awkward mixing of DK+Druid+Hunter work competitively, to little avail. We just didn't have the synergy. Luckily, with the last patch, our hunter went from 2xBM+Readiness to a nice Survival build, allowing for better switches, peels, CC, etc., that I felt it might be worth a go on my part to try a Heavy Resto (16/0/55) build and play it "old School." ;)
At the end of the night, some 53 games later, we went 37-16, bringing us up to be ranking number #163 of 35,000+ teams on BG9. Not bad at all. :)
I honestly hadn't had much luck in 3s this season as a Heavy Resto build in part because I am still subject to a fast gib, and I really, really need solid peels since I don't have the "outs" of other healing classes at the moment. I ran with around 800ish Resil, and a Hybrid Balance and Resto set for the extra +50 Resil (collecting all those damn sets comes in handy sometimes!), and tried to be really vocal about both when I needed help, and to also be aware of not putting myself too close to the "Action." Sometimes that "one" extra Cyclone just isn't worth getting into Intercept Range of that watchful Warrior. ;)
On the whole though: we made it work. Heavy hotting, and incredibly heavy direct heals (<3 Nourish) helped. Which makes me really excited for next week.
While I think the Mage "buff" was a step in the wrong direction, and that Rogues still need a little nerf for PvP, generally, most every fight felt potentially winnable against most comps last night. PMR was probably the trickiest, but we still won a few.
The note that was a weird touch of sadness/joy was the entire lack of Druids. In about 120+ games of threes in the last 3 weeks, I've seen about 3 Moonkin, about 5 Ferals, one Resto/Feral Hybrid, and -0- Heavy Resto Druids. :-/ It felt good to almost "represent" what can feel like a struggling breed, but I have high hopes things will even out a bit more as Paladin healing dominance is addressed. I can assure you, even the Rets feel more in "line" with things, and that changes are heading in the right direction.
Still: Happy Monday. :)
A lot "broken" here and there with the patch as well. A friendly hunter FDing, will sometimes drop my target (@$&@$), which reminds me of the old days of WoW when this was how it was in Season 1 and part of Season 2. Shadowmeld seems to not be "working" either, with a sort of built-in lag preventing Shadowmeld --> Swift Flight Form, and a lack of dropping combat in some PvE Encounters and Bosses as well, not to mention a sudden lack of PvP use. :-/ With the right timing, I could feign off an incoming cast, or read as "immune" to a single enemy player spell if I cast Shadowmeld at the right moment during their cast, but.... no more. I don't even know what direction this is headed: if it's a nerf, or a glitch, but it certainly does make my racial poor at the moment.
This week's Arena, when I finally -did- run it over the weekend was a polite mixed-bag. Twos were solid, and then we made the mistake of playing too long (read: into the wee morning hours), and tanking our rating. There's always next week, though. Moreover I'm still iffy about the new system, which basically is not a "zero sum" calculation. Mostly we were winning say, 5-7 points for a win, and the losing team was losing about 4-6 on average. To some extent this gives people that throw themselves into Arena a little pat on the back because you have to steadily chug along to move up, and the slip-ups aren't as soul-crushing (27-29 point losses can HURT), but it still takes a darn lot longer to go anywhere.
Sunday-Night threes, at least, went a lot better and more than made up for 2s. I think I've tried ever spec imaginable and every playstyle to boot to make an awkward mixing of DK+Druid+Hunter work competitively, to little avail. We just didn't have the synergy. Luckily, with the last patch, our hunter went from 2xBM+Readiness to a nice Survival build, allowing for better switches, peels, CC, etc., that I felt it might be worth a go on my part to try a Heavy Resto (16/0/55) build and play it "old School." ;)
At the end of the night, some 53 games later, we went 37-16, bringing us up to be ranking number #163 of 35,000+ teams on BG9. Not bad at all. :)
I honestly hadn't had much luck in 3s this season as a Heavy Resto build in part because I am still subject to a fast gib, and I really, really need solid peels since I don't have the "outs" of other healing classes at the moment. I ran with around 800ish Resil, and a Hybrid Balance and Resto set for the extra +50 Resil (collecting all those damn sets comes in handy sometimes!), and tried to be really vocal about both when I needed help, and to also be aware of not putting myself too close to the "Action." Sometimes that "one" extra Cyclone just isn't worth getting into Intercept Range of that watchful Warrior. ;)
On the whole though: we made it work. Heavy hotting, and incredibly heavy direct heals (<3 Nourish) helped. Which makes me really excited for next week.
While I think the Mage "buff" was a step in the wrong direction, and that Rogues still need a little nerf for PvP, generally, most every fight felt potentially winnable against most comps last night. PMR was probably the trickiest, but we still won a few.
The note that was a weird touch of sadness/joy was the entire lack of Druids. In about 120+ games of threes in the last 3 weeks, I've seen about 3 Moonkin, about 5 Ferals, one Resto/Feral Hybrid, and -0- Heavy Resto Druids. :-/ It felt good to almost "represent" what can feel like a struggling breed, but I have high hopes things will even out a bit more as Paladin healing dominance is addressed. I can assure you, even the Rets feel more in "line" with things, and that changes are heading in the right direction.
Still: Happy Monday. :)
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