efficiency, Naxxramas, skill

Healers? We don’t need no stinking healers!

Last night we did a preliminary run at Naxxramas with minimal healers. First off, here is the WWS if you want to see it. Overall it was pretty fun and a lot easier than I anticipated. Naxxramas is really just not that hard and last night proved how easy it can be. We plan to do it again next week with a different healer composition and taking it a bit more seriously. This week was mostly a test run. Here was our raid composition for most of it:

• Healers: Shaman, Paladin
• Tanks: Feral, Death Knight
• 2 Mages
• 3 Warlocks
• 3 Hunters
• 3 Rogues
• 3 Warriors
• 2 Balance Druids
• 1 Shadow Priest
• 1 Ret Paladin
• 2 Elemental Shamans
• 1 Enhancement Shaman

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Bad Players, elitistjerks, skill

One of the favorite pass times of people in the Benefactor’s Bar is pointing out and making fun of people who are horrible at the game. As mean as it is, it is boatloads of fun and I’m not above being an elitist asshole to a certain degree. Let’s be honest, I read our applications forum and deny 95% of our apps within literally 3 seconds of opening the application multiple times a day. I have a lot of experience being a cold hearted asshole in the privacy of my own home. With that said I bring you some choice quotes:

Ok, thanks for clearing that up. I usually put out 1500 dps (more or less, depending on the instance), so did you by chance mean 2600 dps for Naxx? If I redo my talents and get a couple more epics I’m sure I could do 1600 DPS.

And the response by a shall-not-be-named Benefactor’s Bar poster:

I’m pretty sure I can autoshot/pet attack my way to 2k dps, at least. How do you do 1600 dps without purposely sabotaging your dps?

For reference, the Armory of the person in question is located here. Now I realize that most people don’t take this game seriously, don’t put a ton of effort into their characters, and don’t do a lot of research into doing things the “right” way. But this is a guy on the Elitist Jerks forums, posting about DPS. This SEEMS like the type of person who would actually be putting some effort into, you know, not SUCKING COMPLETE ASS. I just can’t imagine there’s any guides on EJ saying to socket 24 stamina into your gear, to use old world gems, or using items with expertise on them (and gemming for expertise socket bonuses!) as a Hunter. I won’t mentioned the stuff that’s ungemmed or unenchanted; maybe he’s been busy lately or maybe he’s donating all his gold to the Red Cross. I don’t know, I won’t judge.

There’s no real point to this post. Just to have a laugh and get your weekly dose of being an elitist asshole. It’s nice knowing there’s always someone worse than you. Enjoy!

achievements, gear, hardcore/casual, progression, skill, Ulduar

From a reader comment over at Tobold’s MMORPG Blog we get this little gem:

“I think the core of this casual raid vs hardcore raid debacle that WotLK is turning into lies with the age old Gear vs Skill thing. Hardcore raiders prefer to attribute their success to skill. Rather than better geared than casuals, they are better skilled, and the gear is only a symptom of that. The reason that people are reacting so violently to easy Naxx is that it is making it plain to see for all is that gear is really the ONLY thing that matters in WoW.”

“Naxx at 80 has all the same skill requirement as it did at 60 (Plus or minus a very very few changes). You still have to get away from anub’arak, stay out of the slime and behind the boss on grob, change sides on thaddius, dance on Heigan, be smart with healing on Loatheb, and get behind the Iceblock on Saph. If you aren’t “skilled” enough to to those actions, you can still fail in naxx. The ONLY real thing that has changed is the gear requirements (From “Have to have perfect gear” to “You can get by as a fresh level capped character”). Wow is and always has been about the gear treadmill.” click here to read entire article