Posts tagged ulduar
Crusaders’ Coliseum: Love at first sight?
Aug 6th
Gormok the Impaler
Well, patch 3.2 is live and in the mad rush to experience the new instance and raids one wonders if anyone is taking the time to actually see if they’re enjoying it.
GANK Inc made our first attempts at the 10-man instance (Trial of the Crusader) last night with almost no preparation. Did we enjoy it?
Yes. Emphatically yes.
There is something SO refreshing about learning a new encounter from scratch, picking up the Boss’ various abilities, adapting to them, tweaking your strategy and eventually getting him down. Not since Karazhan have we experienced that and even there we had checked WoWWiki for a few tips. Not this night though, oh no!
Just a quick recap for those yet to run in and die…
You face beasts captured by the Argent Crusade in a Ring of Blood style fight. The first is a Magnataur, Gormok, the second two (in our experience) Jormungars, Acidmaw and Dreadscale, and the third, which we did not reach to be perfectly honest, a Yeti type that if I knew my Lore better I would be able to name properly called Icehowl.
It took less than an hour to work out Gormok and that moment of joy as it ‘clicks’ for your party is wonderful! There is barely a break before the Jormungars appear and this is where it gets hard. Over time we worked out the various abilities but failed to down them to face Icehowl before we decided to call it and go pick up some loot from 25-man Flame Leviathan (see how to do this with 10 men here).
What did we learn?
- Some of us need better gear, so the farming of Heroics and Ulduar must continue
- We ARE capable of learning fights without relying on epic raiding Guilds for online guidance
- We can have fun together doing it and not get stressed!
This is useful information for a fledgling Guild Master like myself and I am lucky to have a good Assistant GM and raid leader alongside me. So much thanks to Lichdom.
So yes, we enjoyed it. I wouldn’t say it was love at first sight – this isn’t free Epics we’re talking here! But it is well worth getting stuck into, at least on a part time basis if you’re still kicking, fighting and clawing your way through Ulduar. Let me know how you get on and what you think too.
Farming for Epix or how to down Flame Leviathan 25 with 10
Aug 2nd
Flame Leviathan 25-man
We didn’t have the right make up or DPS for continuing our usual 10-man Ulduar last night. With Mimiron and Thorim to do on the Keepers a wipefest was not appealing.
So why not take the 10 we DO have, mount up on Demolishers and go take down Flame Leviathan on 25-man?
And so we did. It is not that hard.
Ok, so you speak to Brann to do the the thing with no towers up and you grind through the trash. You’ll maybe die once, but just res and run back and mount up again. When you get to Flame Leviathan you adopt these tactics:
- Have 5 Demolishers
- Your 5 drivers spam Pyrite on the boss
- Your 5 passengers feed the drivers Pyrite constantly
- You DON’T shoot anyone up there
- You RUN when he targets you.
And you know what? That’s it. As long as he has at least three stacks of 10 Pyrite on him, he’ll go down with ease. Rinse and repeat on a weekly basis to get some nice loot for your raiding team.
Of all the bosses in all the world…
Jul 28th
Mimiron
I’m not one for complaining about bosses. Having said that I do get frustrated at wiping on one particular boss from time to time. But this, I feel, adds to the joy of finally defeating him (or her – nods to Maiden, Freya et al).
BUT…and it is a big but…there are certain bosses where no matter how well you know the tactics, no matter how well your group is geared and no matter how well your group is drilled in the fight you still wipe more than you should. And the reason is the mechanics of the boss.
At first I thought Hodir was an example of this. He was taking too long. He wouldn’t go down when he should. I was thinking it was the mechanics. Too much can go wrong that is out of your hands. Not so. In essence, it was the collective failure of just two or three in the group. Apart from that one time when we attempted Hard Mode and the damn fire mage guy was considered out of line of sight because he was on the wall…sigh.
So no…Hodir is a practice fight that you should get down every time once you have cracked it. Not quite as easy as Thorim…but up there for sure.
The REAL pain in the ass, too much luck needed, slowing down your progression boss is…….Mimiron!
This guy…this guy must have more of my deaths notched on his bed post than the Alliance Guild, Might Rising. It’s not knowing the tactics. We have them sorted. It’s not individual error. Phases one through three are a piece of cake.
It is phase four. The amount of luck involved in successfully downing Mimiron in phase four is TOO HIGH.
I know there will be a lot of people reading this and thinking “We never have any problems…what’s up with this Guild?”
I’d probably be doing the same in your shoes. At first I put it down to a mental thing – we expected to die, didn’t expect to down him like we do on everyone else. But that can’t be true. We’ve downed him twice. We know our tactics work and work well. But every time we come to face him we wipe far too often before we finally get him. So it must be luck – and luck in phase four only.
It’s wasting time we want to put into General Vezax and then Yogg-Saron. The General has already proved to be an easier fight, though we have yet to down him as we truly learn the fight.
Something needs to be done about the little green-glowing robot and his big, shiny monstrosity, it really does.
