Dominating Druid Healing Part 2

Last time in part 1 we looked at glyphs and spec for trees and had some good discussion in the thread.  It appears that most of you were doing pretty well when it comes to not doing something particularly weird.  Now that you’ve tweaked your spec and glyphs if necessary let’s look at what you should be doing in those raid healing situation to maximize your healing prowess.

There does seem to be some undo concern about patch 3.1 and the effect it’s going to have on us trees.  Unfortunately we can’t effectively answer all of those without making this post way too long.  So while I hate to do this to you, you’re going to have to wait another couple of days to get our complete analysis of how those changes are going to effect us.

Instead, what we’re going to do is tell you what you should be doing now in this post, and then next time I’ll cover how those things are going to change slightly with the new patch.  If we don’t cover the current situation, the changes won’t make a lot of sense and we certainly want to cover them in sufficient detail on both sides of the 3.1 line.  So let’s cover effective healing as it currently stands.

Druid healing is all about making life bars stand still under any amount of incoming damage.  Let’s put damage on a scale from 1 to 5 with Patchwerk hateful strikes being a 5 and something like random trash aoe being 1.

Every other healing class is supposed to use a spell that matches the incoming damage with a heal that replaces what was lost.  A heal too small and the life bar never hits the top.  A heal too big and you just lost too much mana.  The focus here is to keep life bars at or near 100% by applying the proper ‘fill’ spell to top people back up.  Druids are different.

You can think of other healers using a paintball gun to fill in the places that need more green.  A druid uses a lot more finesse.  Druids heal with a collection of brushes; some small, some big, to fill in those empty spots.  It takes more time and patience, but it’s also less messy.

The druid is also going to match incoming damage, but they don’t worry about time quite as much.  Let me explain what I mean.  A Vigilant Shade pops up in Naxx.  The blast shadow bolt hits a number of party members.  There’s going to be another one in a few seconds.  What do you do?  If you’re a Paladin you probably spam FoL to top everyone up.  A Priest hits CoH, a Shaman Chain heal – that sort of thing.  The purpose is to try to get everyone back to 100% NOW.  If you don’t get caught up, the next damage could put some folks in the danger zone – especially if that shade pops out when your group is already engaged with some mini spiders, and a pat, and  . . .

The druid combats this a different way.  Seeing incoming damage he can just throw Rejuvenation on the party members that got popped and then go do something else.  With 2,000 or so spell power, that Rejuv is going  to tick pretty big – and the current damage is taken care of as well as anything further the party member might get from the same mob.  Incoming damage at level 1 and a level 1 style HoT; the next 15 seconds is pretty much taken care of.

The party members’ life bar stands still, basically with no real need to top it off.  Seriously, I hope the shade is dead in under 15 seconds.  Once the damage stops, the remaining portion of the HoT timer will top off the health bar with no need for anything else to be done.  The hard part is trusting that bar to do it’s slow climb.

Another way of looking at it is that HoTs work more like mitigation.  Every HoT you use is more like adding a boatload of armor.  The bar may not move toward 100%, but it shouldn’t drop any more.  What you are doing is counting on the fact that your HoT will be there longer than the damage.  Thus, the time component becomes the real issue.

Which leads us to an interesting point.  Because you can ‘fire and forget’ with HoTs, you can also get really good at anticipating incoming damage and get the HoT in place before the damage happens.  When you do that effectively, now you can talk about keeping a life bar at 100%.  That’s when you’re getting really slick.  Knowing which spell to apply to which party members can pretty much leave the paladin sitting there twiddling his thumbs and doing some DPS because there really isn’t anyone to ‘top off.’  Just ask Zmack about that.

So let’s put it all in perspective.  Your first option should always be Rejuvenation.  It doesn’t heal real big, but it is instant cast and will take care of about 50% of all incoming damage to everyone but your tank.  Let’s call that your level 1 incoming damage heal.  Rank 2 is Wild Growth.  It ticks bigger, especially at first, and you don’t even have to aim.  Rank 3 is Regrowth; nice initial heal and a good HoT on the back end for those times when you are dealing with damage that could really put people at risk.  Rank 4 is Lifebloom, probably the best anticipatory heal you’ve got, but you really need to use it properly.  Also in the Rank 4 category is Swiftmend.  Swiftmend is just nearly on par with nourish and instant cast to boot.  And for Rank 5 damage, Nourish.

Yes, I left out Healing Touch.  There is really never a situation where Healing Touch is the best option.  A glyphed HT is not as good as Nourish at the same cast time.  A non-glyphed healing touch takes almost as long to cast as a Regrowth and Nourish, which would heal for more.  It’s not that HT is a stupid spell, it’s just that everything else is better, so why use it.  I will agree that if you are ever going to pop HT it should be right after Nature’s Swiftness.  But honestly, if you already have a Rejuv and Regrowth on your target, Nourish is a better spell even in that situation.

Also not in the list above is Tranquility, which some of you believe is the best heal we’ve got.  But, considering that even with 2 points in Improved Tranquility, you’ve still got a 4 min cooldown, it’s not really something you can rely on as a ‘got-to’ heal.  Plus, using Tranquility without those 2 points is probably going to take you out of the fight anyway since without the threat reduction you’re basically dead if you use it.  I won’t fault you if you like it, and I’ve toyed with those 2 points myself from time to time, but generally I feel like if I really do my job with HoTs I never need to use it anyway.  And even in those cases where it might save folks, it’s probably a wipe regardless of what Tranq does.  It’s the best “OH CRAP” heal in the game by far, but it’s probably better to just never get to that point in the first place.

So here is how all of this works together.  Let’s say you’re in OS and fighting Sartharion.  The tank is taking Level 5 damage, the off tank somewhere between 3 and 4, and everyone else 1 and 2.  There’s a lot going on.  But the Druid can keep all of the other healers fairly bored.

The tank gets Revuj, LB, LB, LB, Regrowth, Wild Growth.  For the rest of the fight it’s basically keeping those HoTs in place and perhaps throwing in a Nourish from time to time if your other healers are busy.  The Off Tank gets a Rejuv, LB, Regrowth – and you’ll probably let the LB go ahead and bloom.  Everyone else can just get a Rejuv except that mage and Lock who are probably making the Off Tank’s life nutty by pulling aggro from time to time from the fire elemental adds.  Those two dudes get Rejuv, Regrowth and that will probably get it done.

By putting Wild Growth on the MT, those two clothies will probably be prioritized in the list, so no need to target them with that one.  If things get bad, since you’ve already got Rejuv on just about everyone important it’s an easy thing to yank their life bar up a few thousand with a Switmend right NOW and wait for the incoming heal from the other direct healers.

Lifebloom doesn’t go on anyone but tanks.  It is too mana intensive and doesn’t last long enough to just go throwing it around.  The one exception is Sapphiron, where you will want to use a single LB to mitigate the constant level 2 damage everyone is taking.  LB and PoM make Sapph a cakewalk.  But in almost every other case Rejuv is a better choice.  (This is especially true in 3.1, so you might as well get used to it now).

Now, lots of people keep LB rolling on the tank, and that’s a good way to go right now, but considering the changes to LB incoming, you might want to reconsider that and begin using LB the way they intended, and are about to force.  So let’s take level 5 damage and split it into big, really big, and huge.  For big damage, one LB, really big gets a 2 stack, and huge gets all 3.  Then let them bloom.  Yes, go ahead and let them bloom, in a few weeks you’ll have almost no choice anyway, so live with it.

I’ve seen new druid healers throwing LB on everyone first, then trying to get a Rejuv up and THEN doing whatever else.  You can see on our damage tree why that’s upside down.  Start with Rejuv, and then build up from there.  With that being said, you’re also smart people so if you KNOW that the incoming damage is going to be a 3, then START with Regrowth and add a Rejuv.  That’s the way I stack on a tank with Patch incoming.  Regrowth as he starts the pull, Rejuv before Patch crosses the slime, then LB X 3 right as he’s taking the first hit.  Now it’s just on the the off tank(s) to do the same thing, then managing all those HoT timers the best you can.

90% of the time I’m just watching bars with healbot and guessing – “Rejuv or Regrowth?”  Some folks get both, some one or the other.  The best way to learn this is to ask the other healers in your next raid to leave your group completely alone and let you fly solo.  Start watching how your own HoTs work on those life bars.  Put up a HoT and then watch what happens and resist the temptation to top people off.  Open Recount to the Overhealing score and really REALLY try to keep it at 0%.  It’s the only way you’re ever going to get to the point where you know which HoT will fill that bar back to 99.9% with nothing else added.

Really, most of the time you should only be hitting wild growth every time the cooldown is up, throwing regrowth and Rejuv on everyone else and LB the tanks.  That’s 90% of the time folks.  Start with Rejuv, then ADD Wild Growth, then ADD Regrowth, then LB (to tanks only please) then Nourish if needed.  Even then, you CAN very well just hit Regrowth again (until patch 3.1) since Regrowth with Regrowth already on the target is the best heal you have.  Don’t believe me – check this out.

The basic tenet goes like this – If Rejuv will keep the bar from moving left, it’s enough healing.  Once the damage stops it will move it to the right toward 100%.  If you have Rejuv up and the bar is STILL moving left, put up Wild Growth.  Two HoTs up and life still going down?  Add Regrowth so the thing stops moving.  It’s real simple, and remember you have to take into account that those HoTs will still be ticking when there is no damage taking place.  Or, that the HoTs will be ticking bigger than the incoming damage if you have stacked them properly.  That means the bar stands still, and then gradually moves to the right as the damage goes down.

Now, the other healers in your group can make this very difficult to learn intuitively.  They see 75% life and instantly heal.  About the best thing for you to do is some heroics and really play things a little recklessly.  Let your tanks’ health drop closer to 50% or so before you Nourish, that sort of thing, so you can really tell how far that bar is moving.  Don’t just fire your HoTs all over the place even if you have full mana, and wait until someone actually needs to be healed before you HoT them to death.

Also, those other healers will kill your overhealing numbers.  Paladins are the worst.  They overheal more than anyone and will virtually guarantee that your overheals triple.  That’s ok, it’s what they do, but you’ll need to make sure that as you practice this that you keep everyone, especially the paladin, from healing anyone in your group.  Even if you make a few mistakes and have a couple of deaths on trash pulls, you’ll be a much better healer for it.

So there is our analysis of the current methodology of Dominating Druid healing.  I promise we’ll take an in-depth look at the changes in patch 3.1 soon.  If anything, we’re getting some huge buffs.  And our view is that you won’t really even have to change your style all that much, you’re just getting a better Level 5 heal.

I recognize the fact that for the seasoned piece of wood out there you’ve been doing this or something very nearly like it since you were just an acorn.  But for the fellow who just sprouted limbs it will help them refine their style by using the proper priorities.  So test yourself for the next day or two while we work on how to continue making the world a greener place going into patch 3.1.

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Profiting From Season 6

Almost 9 months ago before the start of Season 4 we gave you the heads-up for making loads of gold with this article: http://dominateyourserver.com/2008/06/16/season-4-an-unique-opportunity/  And with all of the other excitement surrounding the simply enormous pile of changes in patch 3.1, along with the opening of Ulduar, the new arena season opening seems to have been overlooked to this point.

So consider this your fair warning.  Miss this and it might be another year or so before you get another chance at huge profits.  If you missed Inscription, this is your shot.  If you don’t think you can hit on the Undeath cards, this is your shot.  It’s simply the best opportunity you are going to have to make a load of gold this year.

Now last time we mentioned this we got some flak.  There are some communist-minded fellows out there who don’t want you to make a big profit in the game.  They feel it should be based on fair play.  Well, that’s nonsense.  WoW is a competitive environment from top to bottom with a closed economic system that is extremely sensitive to supply and demand.  Our advice is to take maximum advantage of these once-a-year opportunities when they come and leave redistributing the wealth to the stupid.

Just in case you need to know – when arena seasons open the previous arena gear goes on sale for Honor or marks or some combination of both more than likely.  Beyond that there is a whole new gear set that is made available.  Serious arena junkies have a twinker’s mindset.  They will be slamming only the top end enchants into all that new gear the first second they possibly can.

What that means to the enterprising entrepreneur is that demand for the mats on all those enchants, leatherworking armors and spellthreads goes through the roof overnight.  Whether or not you drive prices up, the prices are going to rise.

But I won’t laugh at the QQ’ers this time – just shrug.  There is no stopping this train folks, so you might as well be driving the engine.  Now is the time to start stocking up on the following items:

• Infinite Dust
• Cosmic Essences
• Dream Shards
• Abyss Crystal
• Arctic Fur
• Eternals

It’s a much shorter list than last time because the stuff from BC is pretty much gone now.  The new enchants are so much better, as well as the other item enhancements it would be odd to see someone using older things – even Mongoose is probably taking a dirt nap.

You’ll also notice I didn’t put Gems in the list.  As usual, I only suggest trading in gems if you have a miner and a Jewelcrafter yourself.  Don’t buy gems for resale.  Deposit costs on those suckers will kill your margin every single time.

Now on the enchanting mats, we’re talking serious profits – think 300%.  There seems to be no stopping the market for DE these days.  It is still showing no sign of hitting bottom.  Prices are strong, and demand is outstripping my supply chain each and every week.  Even Dream Shards, which used to be practically vendor junk are selling well.

Of course, the Abyss Crystal is the grandaddy of them all.  The top enchants use way too many of these, and they are still pretty rare overall.  If you can get your hands on even 20k gold worth, you should double your money.  There is no end to the potential on the Abyss Crystal at patch time.

Arctic Furs are required for all of the decent Leatherworking armors, and prices for those may more than triple.  Already in very low supply and high demand, you can expect to not be able to even come close to having enough to sell no matter what the price.  Prices on Arctic furs could reasonably double.

Eternals will see a spike in price too, but probably not on the level of the other things in the list.  We suggest you buy them through the converter module in AADV for resale.  It’s reasonable to expect a 50% increase on types such as water, fire and air.

Also missing the list is the Frozen Orb. The market for those dudes is so volatile it’s hard to predict.  Supply is just massive and we really doubt you will get much more than a 25% bump.  If you feel comfortable on your server dealing with them, it’s not a bad idea, but don’t expect them to be your main profit winner.

Instead of rehashing strategy with you here you can check out our previous article that will outline the most aggressive stance you can possibly take during the Arena Season 6 mats rush here:

http://dominateyourserver.com/2008/07/10/monster-of-the-auction-house/

Again, it’s probably going to make some people scream at you.  But honestly; who cares?

If you position yourself now with good purchases and a pile of gold (around 10,000) to work with you should be able to build up a big stockpile of the mats above before the patch.  If you do DE a lot now, start posting fewer and fewer enchanting mats each week to slow supply until the patch comes out.  Turn down your settings to around 10% discount or so to purchase for DE much more aggressively and concentrate on the 325-375 DE skill level range in your scans.

You probably sell out of Northrend enchanting mats every week as it is.  When you begin to stopselling them the price is going to tick up a touch anyway.  Then on patch day nail the price hard and set the new benchmark.  You’ll still sell out.

Now, not everyone will turn 5k gold into 20k.  I certainly expect to make around 25,000 profit in the week following the patch, and you can too.  Just keep in mind that every server is different, and you need to already be good at working the AH to maximize your potential.  If you don’t know how to do that yet we suggest you learn pretty fast, or someone else is going to make the gold that could have been yours.  Don’t let it happen to you this time – get educated and go Dominate.

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Dominating Resto Druids Done Right – Part 1

I’m about to show my age.  A recent birthday has me feeling it.  So today’s pop reference is a line from the Michael Keaton movie “Mr. Mom.”  He’s dropping the kids off at school for the first time and doesn’t understand the traffic system.  “You’re doing wrong,” says one of his kids.  “You’re doing it wrong,” screams another parent.  “what do you mean I’m doing it wrong?  I’m using the Jack Butler method!”  “South to drop off MORON!,” screeches another mother.  Finally a friend of his wife taps on the window and says “Hi Jack, it’s Annette.  You’re doing it wrong.”  Great dramatic pause, terrific repetition, one of the really memorable scenes in the movie.  Later he even gets to play it off when he really does become ‘Mr. Mom’ telling someone else how it’s supposed to be done.

Well, here’s hoping that if you’ve chosen tree form for your druid that you are not doing it wrong.  and just to make sure you’re not let’s take an in-depth look at what a druid should do, and a little of what they should not.  And it all revolves around HoTs.

That’s what druids do better than any other class, right?  Even though you have a couple of things like Nourish and Healing Touch, the vast majority of the way a tree works is based on the magnificent HoTs you’ve got.  And the whole idea with those things is to do something no other healing class can really do.

If you’ve ever played another healing class, doing the druid thing is going to take some getting used to.  It takes nerves of steel and a lot of patience.  Even if you’ve never healed and somehow ended up in tree form, there are some things you need to know right now before you start messing up. So today we’re going to look at spec and glyphs, and next time out, style points.  You have to have the proper foundation right?

First, use your HoTs, love your HoTs and leave direct healing to everyone else.  Seriously, if Nourish or Healing Touch are more than 10% of your total healing go roll a Paladin and leave the real druids alone.  Druids who use direct heals too often are the shape-shifting equivalents of the huntard or death-not.  And no, Swiftmend doesn’t count as anything but an instant cast, OP, I WIN button – it’s not a direct heal.  (Well it is, but with no cast time it acts more like PoM – only a zillion times better).

So the first one of you I see with the Glyph of Healing Touch is persona non grata at DYS.  You can spec a tree into Healing touch but the problem is that you will have to waste 12 points buffing it, and then the glyph nerfs it all to heck in order to overcome the seriously lame cast time.  You can set up a whole lot more healing with your instant cast HoTs in the same time it takes to cast even a glyphed and specced HT.  And if you did your job properly, you will never have a situation where HT would even cross your mind anyway.

The same almost holds true with Nourish.  The only thing with Nourish is that once you get 4 piece T7.5 it actually becomes a very powerful heal.  That still doesn’t mean you should spam the thing.  As a matter of fact, hopefully by the time you get that kind of gear you’ve also gotten so good at healing that you rarely find a use for even a decent Nourish.  So let’s tell you how to heal like a champion and almost never use a direct healing spell.

The really sweet thing about druids is that they can do more healing than any other class in similar level gear, and still accomplish the feat with less than half as much over-healing.  It’s a seriously wicked combination.  Now, just as with other classes, timing on those heals needs to be good, and you need to select the proper heals for the proper times.  You also need to glyph and talent correctly, and we’re about to tell you how to do that.

Let’s start with spec.  This 14/0/57 build places almost all of your emphasis on more and more powerful HoTs; leaving HT for the saplings out there.  The really nice thing is that this build is also PvP ready. The build as given gives you the best and fastest HoTs you can get.

Another option for the true team player is to take points out of Nature’s Grace and fill up Replenish.  Since you’ll be rolling Rejuvenation a LOT, it stands a good chance of helping your raid.  But you’ll definitely want to be very confident in the prowess of your every little branch before you do that.  Since I am that sort of tree, that’s what I did – to get a build that looks exactly like this 12/0/59 .

Now onward to Glyphs.  Without question – Glyph of Lifebloom.  Allowing Lifebloom stacks to tick one more time gives you a chance to raise your healing power by more than 3,000 in that one second.  Next, Glyph of Rejuvenation makes your main HoT 50% more effective when it matters most.  And in the third slot it’s easy to guess that we would use Glyph of Regrowth; so sweet it will make your sap go all runny.  Now, not only do you get a great HoT out of Rejuv, but the direct heal portion gets a 25% buff if you time it right.  And you will, or we’ll chop you down and use you for firewood at our next party.

Now, if you PvP a LOT you might consider Glyph of Swiftmend.  But honestly since Swiftmend prioritizes Rejuvenation you can hit it and put the rejuv right back on in the blink of an eye.  And now the Rujuv has a refreshed timer, so it’s not a big loss.  Swiftmend is an awesome spell, but the glyph doesn’t make it so much better that you could really afford to lose one of the others – unless you are simply an arena junkie.

I would be remiss not to mention Glyph of Innervate as well.  With this glyph, if you use Innervate on yourself it makes your next 30 seconds spam casting heaven.  You can basically cast everything you’ve got on everybody in range and chuckle as your mana bar stays at 100%.  But, if you’re a good little tree, you can get a nice mana boost for 20 seconds if you use Innervate on the poor little Holy Priest who is sucking wind at the end of Phase 1 Malygos or halfway through Patchwerk.  Paladins seem to never run out of mana anyway, but this glyph does have some nice situational uses.  But just like Swiftmend, it may not be worth giving up one of the other glyphs for this one unless you have team members that have serious mana issues.  If that’s the case your only real solution might be to come join Dominate.

Minor glyphs for druids are fail in the case of resto, so choose your favorites of the worst.  I actually think Glyph of Aquatic form comes in handy.  It doesn’t help you do your job at all, but near epic land mount speed in the water has nifty uses.  It’s great for Strand of the Ancients.  Hop off the first platform, swim down the river to the waterfall at Mach 3 and be taking a nap at the docks before the boats even arrive. I also use Glyph of the Wild and Glyph of Unburdened Rebirth, but something could definitely be said for Glyph of Dash for the PvP friendly or seriously ADD.

That’s it for this segment.  Now you know if you’re doing it wrong.  And I’m giving you time to go trim away the deadwood before we get into how to go from being next in line for the furniture factory to the most popular stick in the shed.  Next time we show you how to waddle your way to Domination.

23 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Some times the more things change the more they remain the same.  But that certainly doesn’t seem to be the case with WoW.  In a little less than 22 months with BC and WotLK the game can truly be said to be so radically different than the original it’s almost a completely different thing.

The things that are completely different don’t just apply to the original pre-BC game.  There have been so many changes in WotLK that certain aspects of the game have either cropped up as completely new (like actually decent crafted epics) to other things almost disappearing entirely.

I live in New Mexico.  It’s been a long-running joke that no one else in the country seems to ever remember that we’re even a state.  New Mexico Magazine even has a segment it still prints in each edition to this day entitled “one of our 50 is missing!”  With silly stories about people back east warning their friends to “be sure to get your shots” before traveling to Santa Fe to visit grand-kids and stuff like that.  New Mexico is a bit like Grull’s armpit – you know he probably has one but you never think about it.  Especially since you never plan on visiting there.

Well, along the same lines, there is a part of WoW that I used to really enjoy (now that I miss it) that is simply gone.  You never hear about it, you never talk about it and it’s pretty much only in PvP that you ever even see it.  Crowd Control, once an important part of almost every instance and raid simply went “poof” in Wrath, and it’s probably a bigger problem than you think.

Well, it may not be such a huge problem if Blizz decides to just let it disappear into a BG or Arena only event.  But if Ulduar is a real challenge, then lots of people may be in trouble for a while.  Now, my guess is that CC is going to make a huge comeback, but that’s only going to make the learning curve on Ulduar that much more brutal for the majority of people.

It’s looking like CC has become an almost lost art. I remember having to get really good at chain trapping as a hunter even in runs like Shattered Halls, to say nothing of Kara.  We even tried to make sure that we had at least 2 CC toons on every run just to make life and pulls a lot easier.  Granted I wasn’t in the most Dominating guild at the time, but it was pretty much the norm.

Not so in Wrath.  I can count the number of times I’ve used CC on one hand.  And both times had to do with Mind Control in Naxx.  And it’s not just that people have forgotten how to use CC because they haven’t done it in a year, but tanks have forgotten how to keep pulls away from CC mobs and DPS guys don’t even know what to look for any more.  So even if you do CC something, the chances the CC will break on it’s own is virtually zero.  It has become almost completely pointless to attempt.

Now, certainly everyone could re-learn CC pretty fast, but I really thought it was much more fun to wait for sap and sheep and then only have a skull and X to deal with than just doing the chain 4 pulls we do now.  Bringing back the CC necessity would also level the playing field on DPS for all classes since you couldn’t just spam AOE for 7k DPS on every trash pull.

I know there have been lots of complaints about the way Wrath works, but overall I like it.  But the loss of certain elements that were once absolutely crucial to success in PvE makes me miss some things about the way we used to have to play.  So when you’re out there in BG’s start working on your CC a bit, it’s probably only a matter of time before it comes roaring back in your face.  Especially you hunters, all I ever see is frost trap any more – no one even lays a Freeze trap for the nostalgia of it.

So it wouldn’t be a bad idea to throw a little old school into your pulls – at least on heroics or something, anything to keep yourself sharp.  I know you don’t have to, but it will make you feel better, I promise.  So enough of this QQ, just had to get that off my chest.  Just don’t forget that CC is a great way to DOminate, and here’s hoping it makes a comback very soon.

26 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

In our last article we covered achievements as something you might have overlooked.  Depending on your preferences that might also be the case for Wintergrasp.  The same can be said for heroic dungeon runs.  So let’s take a peek at why you might want to kill some time there when you’re bored.

There are so many things to do in WoW that it’s really impossible to find time to do them all and have a life.  Professions, making gold, raids, rep grinds, achievements – this game could easily chew up all your time.  So people prioritize.  Even when it’s your job (as is the case with me) you still have to more or less concentrate on one thing at a time in order to truly get to the point where you are Dominating.

For the last few months after WotLK, I’ve spent almost all of my time leveling alts and gearing toons for Raids.  And since the guild has progressed well I kind of skipped some things on my druid.  Heroics, for instance, and PvP.  But one of the main reasons for taking the druid to 80 in the first place was for the express purpose of doing more PvP; which, I’ve mentioned a number of times hasn’t really ever been my “thing.”

When I finally made up my mind to get busy with the program of gearing for PvP I naturally started with Battlegrounds.  Up until about a week ago I had never even been in an arena match.  Lame, yes, but I figured it was pretty worthless to do them since I don’t enjoy PvP that much and knew that it was a learning curve best done by gaining some proper gear first.

Sadly I have a bit of pressure from a certain guidie who lives and dies for PvP.  So he says “let’s just do some skirmishes to get your feet wet.”  Then proceeded to queue us up for rated matches.  First time arena fool on a new class.  Painful is all I can say.  I’m pretty nerdy about research and I just hadn’t taken the time to go to certain places like arena junkies to expand my repetoire of information so I was pretty lost.  I’ll admit that it was awful.

So when he finally turned me loose I started back doing what I do best.  I looked at specs and macros, and rearranged all my actions bars so I could shape shift with some degree of fluidity.  Got my CC ironed out in a few battlegrounds and began looking at what gear I needed to get my resilience above zero to some number that would actually do me any amount of good.

I’m glad to say that in less than a week we are now winning more than we are losing, but I still have a long way to go.  But it’s not just that I have a huge hole in my game for PvP – I also had overlooked Wintergrasp and Heroics.

If, instead of spending so much time working on a few other things that interest me, I had made an effort to attend WG whenever possible, and done a few heroics every day, my PvP gearing would be much further along.  With Wrath, Blizzard was apparently shooting for balance in game play so you really don’t have to just BG until your eyes bug out any more.  As a matter of fact, it’s not really possible.

Enter Wintergrasp.  There are some Deadly Gladiator quality items available from the vendor there, but you have to have Wintergrasp marks to spend.  If you don’t do Wintergrasp you can’t get them.  The advantage is that if you can get your boots and helm for a mere 55 marks.  So if I had done WG even once a day over the last 3 months I would have had something like twice that number even if we lost every single one.

Wintergrasp matches also reward more honor than almost anywhere else you can go, especially if you are winning.  Do it a couple of times a day and what with the daily and a couple of wins you can garner something like 7-10 marks, 3,000+ honor points and some stone keeper’s shards to boot.  Not bad for 30-45 minutes worth of work.

And then there are heroics.  If all you do is PvE and raids, you’ve probably long since stopped running these.  But it’s not a bad idea to do a few when your faction holds Wintergrasp for the emblems of heroism and stone keeper’s shards.  This was another thing I missed.  Since I didn’t need anything from heroics because of 25 man raids, I just quit doing them.  But if I had, I could have at least picked up a couple of bits of blue PvP gear for some more resilience right off the bat.

Plus, since you need arena rating and points to get the Deadly Gladiator shoulders, you can pick up the BoA shoulders for 50 resilience just to get you started on the right foot with the stone keeper’s shards.  It’s not a perfect plan, but it’s a way better option than almost anything PvE.

I’m sure most of you are aware that you can also get a decent start to you PvP set by doing Vault runs, which is a nice twist in Wrath.  The only problem is that you will be at the mercy of the loot tables and getting the chest, hands and legs from the same part of a Deadly set from the stone watcher would be a long process.  (It’s not a terrible idea to blend sets either since the 2 piece set bonus is +50 resilience.)

Anyway, if you’re wondering what the real point is I’ll get to it.  I found that if I had just done a few WG battles from time to time as well as helped out some guildies by doing those heroics I could have entered those first arena matches with a much better set of gear.  By skipping all that stuff I am now faced with the fact that I pretty much have to do it anyway.  You might as well get it out of the way now before you decide to get serious about PvP.

It is nice that you can get ready for PvP more effectively than ever by just doing a few PvE things and a pretty fun battleground from time to time.  It’s not unreasonable to say that you could do a couple of heroics, and a couple of WG battles a day for a month or so and end up with 7 or 8 pieces of really decent PvP gear and a resilience rating around 400.  Which certainly isn’t going to hurt your chances at all.  And don’t forget that you can add a couple of pieces from the Hateful set if you save you emblems of Valor as well.

So if you’ve been looking at Wintergrasp and Heroics as a waste of time, just ask yourself if you ever plan on taking your toon into anything bordering on serious PvP.  If you do, adding those runs to your routine will put you in a position to just run out and buy your starter set when you do get ready to get with the ganking.  It’s a whole lot easier to Dominate if you’ve got the right gear.  So go blow up some easy instances and a few buildings and I’ll see you in those rated matches soon.

25 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

There really isn’t some big hint in this post.  But you never know where you’re going to learn some little something.  And lately I’ve really changed my mind about achievements and it leads to this post in an interesting way.

I’m a big Terry Pratchett fan.  The Discworld stuff is hilarious.  Pratchett’s influence on my writing is probably less than obscure for any of you who have read much of his work.  If you haven’t read Pratchett I highly recommend the guy.  You’ll laugh yourself silly (considering you ever get out of the game long enough to read any more).

Well, in his book “The Truth,” his hero (anithero?) becomes the first newspaper man in Ankh-Morpork, the big metropolis of Discworld.  One bit of sage advice he gets from the Patrician is to be careful what you report.  “People don’t want news,” he says “what they really want is olds.”  The point is that you need to report on things people already know about because really NEW things freak people out.

What people want more than anything is recognition for accomplishment.  Since most people never really accomplish anything noteworthy sometimes you have to give them a way to recognize themselves.  Achievements do both of these things.  People like to see their name in print, and stuff like titles works just fine for that.  But for those who are competition oriented, they might very well find a bit of extra motivation by comparing their achievements to others.

So this is a little bit of olds.  Every time we do news people freak out, so hang in there with me for some good olds.  The key to doing olds is to put a twist on them so they look like news.  Therefore we arrive at the premise.  It may be time to rethink how you feel about achievements because they really are olds, and you like them more than news even if you don’t know it yet.

I haven’t paid a lot of attention to achievements overall on my druid and there is a really good reason why.  I follow my own advice (most of the time unless I’m having serious thinking issues like last week as some of you know) and Mr. Hotstotrot was speed-leveled to 12, then dungeon power-leveled on a RaF account to 62 or so.  Then it was questing in a group of 3 all the way from there to 80.

So I hit 80 with like 50 achievement points.  It’s really bad.  My true original main was a night elf hunter and that one would have probably something like 10,000 points if they had existed in BC.  But since my main was new (my metaphor is beginning to mix I know) it was frustrating to even look at the achievement panel.

Combine that with the fact that my first toon to 80, a priest had done almost all of the heroic stuff, and cooking, fishing, and so many other achievements that it merely added to the frustration.  Why bother, right?  I began to feel like another pop phrase you see from time to time: “I was put on this earth to accomplish a certain number of things – right now I’m so far behind I’ll never be allowed to die.”

But I changed my mind over the last couple of days because of two dungeon runs.  We’ve been hearing that people are pretty frustrated with the state of raiding in WoW compared to the original.  40 man raids on KT were absolutely BRUTAL at level 60 in T1.5  or T2 gear.  And many guilds went after the guy for months on end before they got him down.  After a kill, it might be just as long again because there just wasn’t enough gear to go around to make things all that much easier.

Compare that with Naxx now.  Hotstotrot went from quest greens to full T7.5 in about 3-4 weeks.  In just over a month he is now 9 of 17 best in slot, and one trinket away from the “epic” achievement.  And everything that isn’t best in slot is like #2 or #3 on the list.   Getting full T3 would have taken much longer than that even for alts in whatever power guilds were out there in pre-BC.

But I now feel that achievements have added a level of suspense you just can’t get after you have things on farm status.  And I have two good examples to back it up.  Achievements have been called a cheap way to spice up a game going stale, but might they instead be a brilliant way to make “olds” into “news?”  Well that’s right up my alley.

So there I was – in an impromptu Naxx 10 man late late Tuesday night.  We decided to do the timed run on the spider wing and we did it with 3 minutes to spare and not one death along the way.  Kinda sweet, “undying anyone?”  We laughed at first, but when “the safety dance” achievement triggered and not too long later as we were standing at the dead bodies of the Four Horsemen with no deaths and only Saph and KT to go something really changed in the team.

Ive never seen people focus like that.  I mean, even when we were first wiping on those two it was more like getting over the frustration of dying than a focus on winning.  Now that we’ve won so many times that our expectation is to win, the mental shift is striking.  When you add PRESSURE to win with excellence it’s a whole new thing I’ve never really seen in the game.

Well the rest of the story is that we didn’t get undying (MT computer fail in a void zone – ouch), but I have to tell you that the feeling in that raid was awesome.  We were having more fun, were more excited, more focused, more NERVOUS, than at any time in the last two years I’ve been playing.  It was way FUN again, and I thought we were already having fun.  A farming run had turned into the best bit of emotional rush I can remember since whacking Malygos for the first time.  And that was more relief than excitement.

Then last night we did 10 man OS with 8 for the “less is more” thing.  We thought we would add a little more spice and do it with a drake up at the same time so that those without “twilight assist” could get that one too.  We didn’t pull it off, but instead of leaving with just a few bits of gear none of us really needed, we at least got “less is more” out of the deal, and again, we were laughing and cutting up the whole time.

So in two days I’ve gotten over the thinking that achievements are just a gimmick.  Now I know they are a gimmick, but the weird thing is that it’s a sweet gimmick.  I’m not sure it makes me love the idea of chasing achievement for achievements sake (even though I do run around like an idiot doing explorer from time to time when I’m dual boxing doing scans and what-not at the AH)  but what I do know is that every single “same-old same-old” boss fight in the game that we’ve done 50 times already has another level or two we can shoot for.

That little twist can really make a difference in your raiding experience.  And since there are so many achievements in current raids, it’s unlikely you would run out before Ulduar hits, and also unlikely you will do everything there before we (finally) get to beat our heads in on Arthas.

Some achievements force you to change the way you approach boss fights completely – It turns out that “Momma Said Knock You Out” makes the Faerlina fight about 100% easier than having to do the MC thing.  And most heroic level achievements actually FORCE you to play better to boot.  In order to do most of the dungeon achievements everyone on the team has to execute to perfection.  Working on achievements in dungeons will make your whole team get a LOT better.  So don’t tell me achievements are fail.

In other words, achievements, while I can’t say they are my favorite part of the game, have certainly proven to have an irreplaceable effect on how much fun the game can be if you let them.  Now I’m looking at them as such a cool part of the overall experience that they are on par with professions or the AH or any number of cool bits that the game just wouldn’t be the same without.

So in the end achievements are the way Blizz made Havelock proud – they made news out of olds.  They are useless and trivial and way more fun than almost anything else in the game.  And that’s why achievements are a truly Dominating way to re-experience all those olds in a completely new way.

18 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

“A funny thing happened to Lawbringer yesterday.”

I was beginning to think everyone had fallen asleep.  It’s been a while since we stirred up any real controversy (ie. the rogue article by he whose name shall not be spoken) but let me tell you that when Law steps in something it’s a big steamy pile of Kodo poo.

It was the perfect storm of events that lead me to perhaps the greatest brain fart of my tenure here at DYS.  And what I REALLY wish is that I had saved it for 13 more days – it would have been the perfect April Fool’s gag.  So before anyone thinks I’ve lost my marbles here is what happened.

I’ve been kicking myself for a couple of weeks about not doing Jewelcrafting on at least one of my 80’s.  And since I don’t farm mats it’s been bugging me that I didn’t knock that sucker out while leveling instead of engineering or something.  So I’ve been chewing on how to fix the issue on not only the Horde side, but also on the little army of Alliance toons I have working their way to 80.

You see, I don’t like JC at all.  It’s a royal pain with very little profit potential overall (don’t argue with me on that one) compared to say enchanting.  So with my bankers’ mindset I have always ignored it like my wife’s smelly dog and avoided it completely.  But with my toons now getting bit after bit of 25 man raid gear and almost every single one with sockets to fill (and building that PvP and feral off set for the drood I might add) the gem costs were beginning to make me mad.

I also am not super fond of Death Knights.  I will never play one.  They just don’t interest me at all.  I know some of you guys think they are the best thing since sliced sushi but I can’t see playing another DK among the 5 bazillion DK’s on our server.

Next, I already have four level 80’s on the Horde side, and every single one has two profession maxxed at 450.  To add Jewelcrafting I was faced with the prospect of running some trash toon to 60, transferring a level 50 from another account and THEN leveling to 60, OR (sigh) biting the bullet and pushing up a DK to 60.   Then you have the problem that if I used the DK to do JC he would have to get to at least 70 to do the JC dailies and 80 makes more sense so now I’m pissed that I need to burn a profession on one of the 80’s and then do it all over again on the DK . . . . .frustration sets in.

Combine all of that with some serious wife aggro AND the fact that in the software we use to run DYS the “SAVE” and “PUBLISH” buttons are right next to each other in the preview screen and WHACK!  Lawbringer made a booboo.  But let’s set the record straight shall we?

It takes a little bit of mental agility from time to time to ‘think’ about the game like the average dude out there in Azeroth.  Now, I don’t mean that to say they are average players, we certainly know a LOT of our readers are fantastic – just read the feedback we get.  But in order to do what Gavin and I do we have sort of gotten a little – well – weird.

So when I wrote – “just nab 4 DK’s to do all the professions with and give your main the good stuff” it makes perfect sense to me because every single one of my 80’s is on a separate account.  So there I was watching Sports Center at 1am this morning when it hit me what a TERRIBLE article I had written because I do things kind of oddly and the whole thing was just pretty dumb to the guy with only one account.

So YES – I am aware that you can only have one DK per server.  So MY ability to drop a whole team of DK’s onto Fenris to do professions does not amount to advice that any normal human being could follow.  So let’s try this again, now that I’m back in a little place you guys call reality.

Maximizing Professions With Death Knights

We’ve always recommended that everyone should strive to have a toon with every profession in the game.  And since WotLK this has become a pretty steep challenge, especially for the new player.  The thought of taking 6 toons – to level 60 at the minimum can be a little staggering even with the changes to experience gains.

To really throw a few more rocks into the mix, Blizz decided to have a few professions give a toon such great buffs that a serious player can hardly ignore them.  So I’ve changed my mind a bit about professions (read above ) and there really is a better way to manage them than we’ve been able to before.

Enter the Death Knight.  The DK starts at level 55, and by the time you even leave the starting area you should be around 58.  DK’s also level wickedly fast, so even if you choose to go all the way to 80 with the guy you’ve got a 55 level head start on anything else.

Since you have to hit level 60 to train Grand Master level in any profession the DK is a sweet choice for filling up your ability to make just about anything in the game with professions without ever really having to depend on the Auction House.

So let’s start from the beginning with this.  We’re going to give you the whole list of professions, sorted in order of our own completely subjective and arbitrary system of importance.  Then we will tell you why we rank them this way and which ones you should probably give your DK as a part of a complete system of Domination.

• Enchanting – the mother load of gold making.  If you only have 1 profession this is the one to have
• Jewelcrafting – wicked JC only gems in 3 slots
• Blacksmithing – 2 extra gem slots for those killer JC only gems
• Inscription – by far the best shoulder enchant in the game, cya Sons of Hodir rep.
• Alchemy – 4 hour flasks and a bigger buff from every flask you use, nice.
• Mining – if you simply MUST farm, it’s hard to beat mining, plus toughness bonus.
• Herbalism – another decent way to kill time and make some dough, plus an extra heal.
• Tailoring – still a nice choice, some of the epic patterns are very good.
• Leatherworking – on par with tailoring.
• Engineering – sigh on the vendor mats for the cycle being 15k eh?
• Skinning – last, and probably least, except for maybe a rogue.

Now if you’ve been reading DYS for a while we have always said that the way to maximize your earning potential is to have almost every profession so you can ‘feed’ yourself mats and make stuff to sell.  It will really put you on a whole new level of gold earning potential.  However, before WotLK professions were basically only really useful for making gold, but Wrath changed all that.

NOW, you definitely want to consider how much you may be missing out on your main if you’re doing something JUST to make extra coin with your profession with no thought to the buffs you could be getting from something else.  It is VERY hard to beat the Blacksmithing/Jewelcrafting combo for sheer killing power bonuses (or healing or tanking or whatever you want to insert there).

So our revised advice is this: you still HAVE to have an enchanter at level 375, but you should really consider JC, BS, Insc. or Alch for your main raiding toon.  It would be better to say and.  JC and BS, Insc. and Alch – something like that.  You really cannot afford to completely ignore just how much power you are giving up by not using two of those professions. (yes LW is not a horrid choice either, and Ench does get ring enchants).

And I know this is hard to swallow for some of you (like myself) who really REALLY hate JC.  But I may just have to bite the bullet and do it.  Substituting 3 Runed Dragon’s Eye for 3 Runed Scarlet Ruby is an increase of 39 spell power, and when you combine that with Blacksmithing so that you only give up one ruby over your current gear it’s an increase of 77 spell power.  77 SP is nothing to sneeze at.

Flask of the Frost Wyrm goes from 125 spell power buff to 156 with alchemy (and from 2 to 4 hours duration), and the difference between Greater Inscription of the Crag and Master’s Inscription of the Crag is 37 spell power.  Those two professions together give you 68 more spell power.

So the point here is that you definitely want to consider how professions help your raiding toons just as much (if not more) than which ones earn you the most gold.  Now, what the heck does a DK have to do with all of this?  Well that sort of depends on whether your DK IS your main or not, but you’re going to have to live with yourself on that one and sort through the rest of this the best you can.

If your main is NOT a DK, then you have two good options.  The first, and probably best option is to give the DK Enchanting and then Leatherworking or Tailoring, although you will probably want to get them to level 80 anyway if you go the tailoring/LW route just to make it easier to sort of max those two things out.  You have to hit Exalted to get the epic spellthreads from some folks so that might be more than you want to do – but chanting is a no brainer here.  Enchanting has a “buy the recipes” system that has nothing to do with rep, so a level 60 can hit 450 just as easily as a level 80.

Because we mostly use our enchanter for DE work as it is, there is no real reason to have our main be our enchanter, so a DK chanting alt is a great fit.

Next, you could also choose to have your DK be your farming toon.  Give that dude herbalism and mining and have him feed you with mats.  The catch to this one is a bit like the one above, in that this will work far better at level 80 with an epic flying mount.  Still, starting a toon at level 55 makes the run to 80 a LOT easier than leveling up a new toon from 1 and it certainly makes more sense than blowing a profession slot on your main for a profession better suited to an alt.

Now, up until now I’ve been speaking to the guy with one or two 80’s and a single account.  For those of you with something along the lines of “you have how many accounts?” using DK’s for your professions is really slick.  One DK on all of your accounts and you can have all of the professions covered in no time flat.  Plus, you can save the professions with the best bonuses for your level 80 raiding toons.

As I mentioned in my “omg I lost my mind” part of this post above – I have 4 accounts, so popping a DK on each one to pick up the straggler professions like gathering professions and Leatherworking will allow me to drop herbalism from my Druid main and pick up something really useful such as Jewelcrafting without really giving up much time.  I mean, honestly, nothing is easier to level than herbalism anyway.  A DK could do it in about 2-4 hours.  Plus I have plenty of gold for mounts and what not so it sure beats having wasted professions on toons I would like to raid with.

Instead of wasting professions just to have the professions around in case I need them, it certainly seems like a better plan these days to put those professions on a wasted TOON.  And I can’t think of a better place to waste a toon than a DK – just kidding actually.  But the DK does have the advantage of starting at 55, and that fact alone makes them worthy of serious consideration when it comes to Dominating with professions.

ps.  It’s a shame that the other post had to go the comments were REALLY entertaining to read.  Keep them coming folks, and yes, Lawbringer is very human after all.

30 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

With the advent of WotLK we taught hundreds of people how to seriously cash in with inscription.  If you missed out on the initial gold rush there, there is still hope.  You don’t even have to be a scribe to take advantage of this one.  But if you haven’t dropped inscription yet you might be even better off.  This little deal might make all that time spent between November and today worth it.

If you’re been trying to make any gold with inscription at all you probably have been doing some card crafting trying to get bits of the Nobles deck which awards
Darkmoon Card: Greatness http://www.wowhead.com/?item=42987. 

For at least a little while, Nobles cards were fetching anywhere from 1k-4k on Fenris.  And while the market has slowed some, you can still do pretty well with Nobles cards (and a few others) if you can make them in any quantity.

Just in case you need it, here’s a material list for the cards:
http://www.wowhead.com/?spell=59504

-1 Resilient Parchment (Vendor bought)
-6 Snowfall Ink (created from Icy Pigment, rare mill drop from any Northrend Herb.
Can also be bought with 10 Ink of the Sea from a vendor in Dalaran http://www.wowhead.com/?npc=33027)
-3 Eternal Life
-3 Ink of the Sea (creater from Azure Pigment, common mill drop from any Northrend
Herb)

Now some decks aren’t so great, and that’s why the card prices are crap.  Chaos is good, Prisms is nice, but why is Undeath so bad that noone will buy it and its price on your server is low?  Because it has a 45 second internal cooldown and the proc gives a little less than 1,000 damage, making it basically…useless, unless you really need the passive crit that much (and you don’t).

So why are we just telling you things you all probably already know?  Well, if you play a lot on
the PTR (like me :p) you will have noticed that the popularity of the death cards has vastly increased.  This is because its internal cd has been lowered to 30 sec, its damage increased to near (and often over) 2,000 per proc AND it can now crit for up to 4,500 damage.

Now, people have complained a lot about the engineering trinket (Lightning Capacitor) being overpowered in PvP with its 3,000 damage every 1 minute (as burst damage), but others (engineers, like myself) have said it’s a sacrifice as it gives nothing during the cooldown and CAN backfire damage on you too. Now with this buff to the Death card, it will become a vastly better than its current iteration.

It wouldn’t be hard to imagine the price for Death cards getting gains in price of double to triple shortly following the patch.  Be aware that these price bumps may or may not stick on your server, so timing is critical.  Scan both Ally and Horde auciton houses to find the very cheapest cards and try to put them into full decks.  Put those decks on the AH on patch day for just a bit less than the Nobles deck to set the new price standard on your server and you should be able to make some serious dough.

Keep in mind that you may not sell any at the new uber price, but starting high is better than starting too low.  It is much easier to undercut than price push every time.  You might even begin posting those decks in the first couple of days before the patch, or now if you don’t mind eating the listing fees to get the price up where you need it to be.  But your best be is probably to nab all the straggling cards out there and hold them until 3.1 – then make some really Dominating coin. 

16 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

There are many misconceptions going around about the shaman these days. One is that a shamans totems are his greatest strength. However, if you ask any experienced shaman in the game they’re all going to tell you the same thing. It is not the totems that make a shaman, it is their weapon imbuements; the four currently available are, Flametongue, Frostbrand, Windfury, and Earthliving. What many don’t realize is that each of these imbuements in itself is more powerful than any enchant in the game. Because of this, shamans are able to cut back on certain talents and make up for them with imbuements.

Perhaps the best example of this is the Dual Wield Chain Heal restoration talent specialization. Now, before you scoff consider this; currently the best main-hand/shield combo for a restoration shaman is Torch of Holy Flame and Voice of Reason both from 25 Kel’Thuzad. The shamans restoration weapon imbuement Earthliving Weapon, adds 195 healing and has a 25% chance (if your using Earthliving Glyph) to apply the Earthliving heal over time affect to the recipient of the heal, which heals for 642 over 12 seconds(modified by spell power).

As you can see this imbuement alone is going to do more for you than the shield. Now below tier 8 talents in the restoration tree there are no “chain heal” talents. So if you only go as far down as Improved Chain Heal and Natures Blessing, then dump the rest of your points into Enhancment to receive the Duel Wield ability you can now have two Earthlivings active at the same time (0/31/40). Of course there are no spell power off-hand weapons so your best bet is to go with a weapon with as much haste or critical strike rating as possible.

So an off-hand enchanted with 63 spell power and Earthliving will give 187 spell power plus whatever haste or crit the weapon you’re using already has, which will benefit your talents much more than any shield. When using the glyph of chain heal, your chain heal will jump to four different targets, as the percentages of EL do stack you will now have approximately 45% chance of applying the EL heal over time.

I have played with this spec through several 25 man raids and found that not only am I able to keep up with the HoT crazy druids, but am even able to top the charts with very little effort. For example, my last downing of Heroic Patchwork with this spec, a fight where the raid itself is taking no damage but your three tanks are taking massive damage, I was able to keep the EL hot up on all three tanks for 87% of the fight, and out of six healers I was responsible for 37% of total healing done by simply spamming chain heal on my target tank.

The biggest drawback to this spec is that besides chain heal your only heal that you will be speced into will be Haling Wave which has a much longer cast time and healing potential than lesser healing wave. This will call for a bit more guess work and over healing (Glyph of Healing Wave will be your best bet for single target healing in this spec). Bear in mind this is a pure raid talent spec, in five man content and arena the more widely accepted lesser healing wave spam spec is far superior.

As the game changes I find that one talent spec is becoming less and less dominant over another. Because of this the players who are able to adapt and take advantage of these changes first are the ones that will truly dominate. So start studying up on those patch notes, experiment, and most of all keep the game fun.

13 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

 You’ll have to pardon us a little shameless self-promotion.  But we couldn’t help passing on a little news about the progression of the Dominate guild.

We’ve never made any bones about the fact that we are a casual guild overall.  We have a number of members that come from more “serious” raiding guilds and they will be the first to tell you that being in Dominate is a much more enjoyable experience.  But we’ve never excluded anyone as evidenced by a membership ranging from truly elite players to 60 year-old grandmothers.

You really can have your cake and eat it too, as it turns out.  You can progress through content and have a good time to boot.  We’re not really trying to compete with the top guilds on the server – no competitive jockeying for bragging rights, but as you can see from the realm rankings above it sure hasn’t stopped us from being among the very best raiding teams on the server.

The point is – well, ok, there is no real point here.  But a point COULD be made that if you treat people fairly and team up with people you enjoy playing with you can do very well without all the yelling and jerkness (no not a real word either) normally associated with hardcore raiding.

Most guilds seem to think that failing via wipes on anything like a regular basis means you need to be harsh with folks.  Get it right or get out.  We prefer to enjoy the experience of letting people learn together.  Improve as you form a real team.  A team not held together with an iron fist, but rather something approaching brotherhood.  “Remember when Saph was SOOOOO hard?”  That sort of thing.

Going through tough times together really makes the end result a lot sweeter.  I suppose you could say the same thing about garnering a world first kill or something, but I’m not sure those guys really have as much fun as we do.  We wouldn’t trade a world first for blowing the fun out of the water along with it.

It is a game after all, and you really should have a good time in the process.  Well, Dominate IS having a ton of fun – AND we’ve achieved something we never really thought possible in the process.  And no, the #5 ranking isn’t it.  What we have done is make some real friends in a way we never have playing WoW.  Oh, but the ranking is kind of nice too.  Not bad for a casual guild eh?

Anyway, when we say we know what we’re talking about it’s not ALL research and theorycrafting.  A whole lot of what you read on DYS is truly from Dominating in the game.  We’ll let our results speak for themselves but we just wanted to remind all of you that you can Dominate AND help a whole lot of people have a lot more fun along the way.

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