PuG Tales: KT and 25 Man Naxx PuG

Ah life on a new Realm. Its pretty damn quiet when you don't know anyone and no one at all. So it can be very relaxing just going about doing whatever you feel like doing or doing nothing at all. Its often good to be stress free! So was in Dalaran saw a note in Trade a Paladin was LFM for 25 man Naxx. They needed some dps. Hey I got dual spec. /w I can dps Ret. Yeah PuG always get a bad name, right! Have a little Adventure sometime to see what goes on on your realm.

This happened on the weekend. It was about 3PM in the Afternoon on Saturday. I said why not, I have no guild that I'm apart of, and If I don't take the chance to PuG it despite whatever may happen either way that's a potential loss of Badges and chance at loot. Hey may make some new friends as well on my new Realm maybe. 

Took a little while to get all the group together. Raid was mostly a 25 man PuG group made up with at least a dozen members of one the guild on my new Realm that was leading the run of which both Tanks the Warrior and the Paladin belonged to.

So I DPS as Ret and only switched back to Protection for adds on Glutch to help out. Just about somewhere in 4-5 hour later. We full cleared Naxx 25. And with that I got my first kill of KT and as dps. Unfortunate that I didn't get a KT kill with my recent and former guild on my old realm I just left. 

The run was the fastest run of Naxx I've ever been on. There was one break at Thaddius for like 5 mins max at most. So was good for a Bio break. But the run went rather smooth for the most part and fast. Though close a few times, we had no wipes of any kind until Sapphion if I remember correctly where we wiped once due to positioning mess up and on KT we wiped twice once due to not making the enrage timer and too many people down other time was on some positioning as we had a bit of melee group as well.

But loot distribution was damn fast. You rolled on everything if you needed it for your spec. Roll was on main spec and if no one did you roll for gear for off spec. Since I showed up as Ret that was my main for the raid, so I only rolled on Ret gear only. Funny though more tank gear seemed to drop as well. That always seems funny how that works, bit I had no stress about it though. 

Everything on loot distribution went real smooth without all the crazy stuff you sometime hear about on loot. The Paladin who OT/MT with the Warrior not sure if he was using a addon of some kind but seems liked it. But as soon as he posted the loot to roll on it auto counted down from 5 down to 1 and you had to have rolled on the loot in that time. If you didn't you missed it. Yeah some people missed it if they weren't paying attention as well. So loot was done real fast. 

Most i really cared on the run was to just have some fun and maybe pick up a Libram for my Ret set. Unfortunately no Libram of Radiance dropped. But I did pick up a nice Ring for dps and I got my teir Shoulders finally for Ret set as well which was really nice pickup. My Historical /roll on loot is very un-impressive in all of WotLK and all the way back in Kara days. As well picked up another nice Belt for my Tanking Set. Will have to edit that in when I can as can't remember what it was.

But it was nice to do a run and seeing things differently as a DPS and much different things are as well vs from a Tanking view usually. But I had fun and in a PuG raid as it was. Didn't make any real friends as things was just going fast really. Both Tanks was really cool and friendly and we got a full clear and downed KT which was all great for the Achievement finally. And thanks to popping Divine Sacrifice with KT low on HP that saved the day as well. As a result I picked up enough Emblems of Valor from the full clear to finally get me the Epic Badge Boots as well which is another good thing to finally pickup also. As for DPS I was somewhere usually between 5-10 for dps and on KT I was #5. I guess thats good for being a non DPSer at heart as well.

I'm glad I decided to so have some fun. PuGing is a way of life for me so nothing new. Some new badges, some new gear. Repair bills I can afford because I make enough money in my business dealings that I don't have worries of any kind. 

I guess It was a good day and thanks to the guys from the Brew Crew guild as well for fun times and seem like good people there. Was a damn fun run. That reminds me why I personally play WoW, for FUN. I don't play WoW for raiding or for epic gear. I play to have FUN, the rest happen in the process!

A Week in Raiding Naxx 25 and Upgrades

Our guild headed back to Naxx over the weekend. Fortunately it worked out with my work schedule that I could attend the raid and not working night shift at work. The biggest problem attending guild weekly raids is usually my work schedule that week as my shift can switch back and forth from nights to days to nights etc. So we headed back to 25 man Naxx with a full raid. 

Sometimes raid missing a person or two but this time it was full. We had almost all of our various usual guild tanks in the raid most having a duel spec as well so one or two was dual as dps as needed. But we had enough tanks for the raid as tanks. I was pretty much OT for most of the raid for this week and that's all fine. On some boss when I wasn't really needed as Tank I just switched to my dual spec for now as Retribution and did DPS. I've never really DPS as a Paladin, In raids or other than leveling up my Hunter alt but that's just questing etc. So on some boss like Heigan I DPS and lived through it, thanks to our druid that was the marker for the fight. That was fun. On that movement intensive fight I did like 1994 dps with our guild top Ret Paladin at 2445 dps. Not too bad I guess.

I kept switching back and forth as needed as we cleared the various quarters of Naxx. Sometime it felt like a pain switching back and forth, loosing my own buff I casted on the raid and some people loosing Paladin Buff since I was casting Sanctuary on everyone. Other time having to remove and add Righteous Fury buff and change Seals every time changed. I was also consuming tons of mana drinks to refill mana on dual spec switching. 

On Loathlab I believed it was I had switched to Retribution and not long after the fight started Loatlab kept eyeing me and I got one shotted. WoW! Cause had Righteous Fury buff up and forgot to click it off switching back and forth from Protection to Retribution. So I inspected the dirty floor of Naxx the whole fight. These just things to be aware of dealing with using dual spec. But we one shot him so was all good. Needless to say I still didn't feel good doing floor inspections. I'm always harder on my self when stuff happen and I know its clearly my fault because it runs through my mind constantly.

On Thaddius who many in the raid hate I especially have grown to like this guy though not on my first visit. As long as timed and made the jump getting to him was fine. But on Thaddius I DPS'd as Ret the fight as the only Retribution Paladin in the raid at that point and we one shot him. Much different to a week or so ago when we had a hard time trying to get him down, not beating the enrage timer and people dying the whole fight. But this time everyone with a bit of experience seem to be more aware what to do. We didn't loose anyone on Thaddius and for DPS as Retribution I did 4664 dps and thats with having a Tanking flask on for HP. I'm not sure how good that is but I was number 10 for dps with the top dps a Rogue at 6369 dps followed by the 2 Warlocks. That's most dps ever did ever and still learning rotating spells for Retribution. But it did help on the Boss.

We cleared up all the wings of Naxx 25 with exception of the Frost Wing and called it a night. I was glad because only got 2 hours of sleep or less before had to go to work. Needless to say that contributed to been sleep at work all weekend long and just being generally tired. The next night we headed back to Naxx to do the Frost Wing which is guild progression bosses for guild for Naxx 25 man raid. 

Sapphiron who gave us a hard time before last week got one shotted this week and was good to see him go down for 14/15 Naxx 25. So off to Kel'Thuzad (KT). Though I've read raid strat before don't always make as much sense till you see it happen. One of our other raid Protection Paladin gave me some pointers for the boss stratergy as well as on my assignment for the fight. Especially since I've never seen or been to Kel'Thuzad before. I've never raided Naxx 10 before so of course never seen his either. But I was assigned to the adds for phase 1. On Phase 2 didn't do much but cast a judgement here and then and just help dispel the frost debuffs from KT on the raid. On Phase 3 I was assigned to pickup 2 of the Guardian of Icecrown adds, the big bugs. I don't remember how low we got KT on the first attempt but it was supposedly less than 20%. That was our best attempt if I remember correctly. 

On the that same attempt I wasn't quite aware or told of a mind control that KT does. Well I got mc'd while on the bugs and got sent charging through the raid killing almost everyone and wiping the whole raid while under KT mind control. I barely knew what was happening and almost seemed funny. Just the wipe was not. That was one our best attempt. I think we did like 4 or maybe 5 attempts in all that I can remember on Kel'Thuzad. One one attempt I remember after the first one in Phase 4 I picked up both Guardians of Icecrown. I was just left of KT chamber where he spawned. I had zoomed out camera angle a bit. I picked up the first Guardian that came though the portal with Hand of Reckoning since it was close. Then saw the other one at the far portal from me heading to the raid. I cast Exorcism on that one to pick it up. Not long after tanking both I went from full health to dead just like that flat. WoW!

On another attempt which seemed like one of our best attempt as well also but had no idea how low KT was on HP. On this attempt we had lost lots of dps and just seem like the raid was just hanging on. One the things was that the raid was melee heavy and lots of the melee on KT had died. Me and the other Protec Paladin in the raid was on the Guardian adds in Phase 4. Seem like we were on those adds for what seem like forever. Quite a few dps had died mostly melee. Healers seem to be doing all they could best I can tell. Those bugs seem to keep getting much bigger and hitting much harder and stacking lots of their debuffs. Just reached a point both OT went down and whatever of raid was left wiped. 

We tried! But after the raid man it seem to get a bit nasty in the guild chat post raid for a while. Some people from the raid and some in particular was pointing fingers at each other or everyone else. Some dpsers was just mad that KT wasn't one shotted or because he didn't fall over and croaked. None of the Tanks in the raid was complaining nor did any of them did. I had to /w the other Protect Paladin that was in the raid asking why people seem to be generally so bitter and negative just because KT didn't fall over like a loot Pinata. 

I just went repaired, called it a night in progression as a guild and logged off for my less than 2 hours of sleep before having to get up at 4 am for a damn sleepy hang over at work. In all i got 4 hours of sleep all weekend. Which reminds me I got more sleep when I wasn't playing WoW and when I was on my recent break from WoW. I slept much better and more restful during all that time. 

Naxx 25 man Upgrades.

So with all the knocking over bosses in Naxx 25 man last week and this week I picked up these upgrades with my DKP often at low bids since most the tanks seem to be a bit civil on bidding DKP for stuff or they have it or a side grade already. DPS always go nuts bidding on stuff which is often amazing to watch.

Bindings of the Hapless - Really needed to upgrade my bracers from the ones from H.Strat Cot.

Gatekeeper - A great upgrade especially with the hit rating as well on it for my ring.

Helm of Vital Protection

Token to pickup Valorous Redemption Shoulderguard

Token for Valorous Redemption Breastplate

Burdened Shoulderplates

Inexorable Sabatons

From Heroics I also picked up another Red Sword of Courage which I've personally seem 4 times now and now have 2 of them each with a different enchant. One has Exceptional Agility Enchant the other Red Sword of Courage has Accuracy Enchant. I carry and use both as needed.

I saw Broken Promise drop 2 times in the same raid from 2 different bosses which seemed unusual. But be nice to see what happens when Last Laughs drops from KT eventually. One of our tanking Warrior and the other Protec Paladin picked up Broken Promise though. I couldn't outbid the Paladin anyway. He has way too much dkp already and don't have way that much.

While in the raid as Retribution Libram of Radiance dropped. I was wearing Libram of Furious Blows I expressed interest in picking it up to replace the green one I was dpsing with in the raid. We had no other Ret Paladin in the raid and the other Protec Paladin didn't seem to care. The Holy Paladin got it, some in raid says I was off spec anyway. Oww! In the Plague Quarter on trash I was still in Ret spec after Heigan was downed and I saw Inevitable Defeat dropped. Nice! I have no idea who got it but seemed like a nice Ret 2H. Since I was dual spec as Ret only I couldn't roll on it anyway and wouldn't seem fair to for all the ones that use A 2H in the raid. One the DK may have gotten it but unsure. I don't count on ever being able to get any upgrade from dual specing as Ret spec while helping out the raid in 25 man Naxx. 

My Ret gear is decent for raids to dual and provide some dps as needed but so far but I may just end up going Prot/Prot for my dual spec. I did spend all the money to fix, gem, enchant my Ret set so its in good working order. But it less worry and agony as Prot/Prot and I can stick to only worrying about tanking upgrades unless no one really needs the plate, which don't seem really likely with as many people with alts that are in our guild. Plus I enjoy being just Prot anyway and I may just stick to that.

Glyphs from 3.1

I've managed not long after the patch to acquire all the new worthy glyphs for Protect Paladins through AH at a low and affordable price all less than 50g each. I picked up enough Glyph of Divine Plea that I was able to mail one to each of our raiding Protect Paladins since they had yet to get it. As well picked up Glyph of Hammer of Righteous and Glyph of Salvation for situational use or maybe use on my dual Prot/Prot spec.

Recent Upgrades from Heroic Naxxramas

Last time over the weekend when our guild was in Naxxramas picked up a few upgrades with my DKP which isn't much in the few times being to Heroic Naxx. Never on regular. Didn't have time to add them to the last post or link them either in a post so just dropping them in here.

Anyway picked up these pieces which adds to rest of my tanking gear sets. Getting a shoulder upgrade seems to be the hardest thing though I have good blue shoulders though.

Valorous Redemption Handguards
Helm of Vital Protection
Chestguard of the Exhausted
Inexorable Sabatons
Defender's Code
Libram of Resurgence. Junk more like it.

Had enough Emblems of Valor from Heroic Naxx so picked up the Platinum Mesh Cloak. It was a debate between this cloak or the ring from the vendor so I went ahead with the cloak as a best in slot since it was kinda likely that I would pick up a Tanking ring at some point easily. Plus I had enough defense that it wasn't a problem either getting the cloak.

During Naxx the tanks seem to be pretty calm about working out gear among themselves bidding on gear as needed. Some already have upgrades and or better and many new drops are sidegrades compared to someone else with a blue geared slot gear. So most of all my gear was low DPK bids on gear especially since I main as a Tank and raid only on one class character.

But what was funny was watching on some drops dps and healers bid up from nothing to several hundred DKP for some drops which was amazing and just fun to watch unfold. It was almost crazy at times to see a DKP bid on a item start not at low DPK but at over a 100+ on first bid and sometimes several people bid on it or bidded it up much much more to make them spend the DKP to get the item. But at time people started bids at over 50+ DKP or over 100+ on first bid and maybe only one person or no one else bid on the item. I just stood there and watch this with all amusement and thinking that person wont have much DPK left.

I remembered the Bracers of the Unholy Knight dropped from Instructor Razuvious I think was the item. Other tanks had good pieces and it might have been a minor upgrade or sidegrade. So our guild Warrior Tank and GM who often raid co-lead needed it too. So it was between me and him good friends as well for the item as we had the same Heroic blue bracers on. We bid and at a certain point at 50 DKP or so I just said man its yours. All good! I knew I couldn't out bid him after all he's been raiding the entire time with loads of DKP, but he spent it to get it. He raids much more than I do also. I didn't have that much more DPK anyway.

Same was when the Breastplate of the Lost Conqueror token dropped. It would have been great upgrade to get to maintain my 2 piece gear bonus on gear over the Heroes Redemption Breastplate. So I bid on that some, up to a certain point then stopped. Warrior GM whispered me asking if that was all I was going to bid or the others was going to win it. I said, nope not bidding any more. I'll get it eventually but I rather save the DPK for something else really needed more for the gear slot especially since I already had the Heroes Redemption Breastplate already. Improvement it would have been yes. But rather save the DKP for something else need to upgrade when it drops. Was all amusing.

Heroic Naxx: Time for a Nap Thaddius!

Yeah take a permanent nap in a deep unholy grave Thaddius! That fight is so much fun for Heroic Naxxramas it took us three times. The very first try could of made everyone eyes bleed. Its was running flawless. We were up against the enrage timer and the last person dropped for the wipe with Thaddius at around 115k health. That was sick.

But we got a few more practice in and got him on the 3rd try. Everything cleared except the very last 2 Bosses in Heroic Naxxramas. Was a good night in Heroic Naxx and a great job by the guild 25 man raid tonight. And I left with Epic Loots for the pillaging.

Saturday Night Heroic 25 Man Naxxaramas

I was really sleepy from Friday night raid of Naxx. For sure I didn't have a 1 hour of sleep between the time Fridays raid and Saturday night raid. I was really sleepy and tired form Fridays raid and having to work all day without much sleep. So when I logged in after working all day Saturday the guild was headed back to Heroic 25 man Naxx to finish where we left off. So I got a invite along again and just helped out however I could but just learning really.

We finished the night at Thaddius the last boss in the construct quarter doing the polarity dance and not being able to get him down before he enraged. We only had 23 people in the raid for the night as well so we were also under dps for what seem like a dps race to me as well on Thaddius.

Anyway we started the night in the Military wing and cleaning it all up and got right back to Instructor Razuvious. We got him down on what seemed like the second attempt in a fun fight and I can say i just about got the hang of it. He dropped some nice gear and i guess it was just as humerous watching the raid members 1 up on DKP bidding on gear and outbidding each other. I found some humor in that. I couldn't bet on much anyway since my DKP is really low compared to many in the raid. So we were off after that and completed the rest of the Military wing.

We got to the 4 Horsemen and after a few tries and misstep during the switches we got them down. I have to say I enjoyed this fight as well. Was a blast. We did the tank the boss in the 4 corner strat it seem and sometime on switch it seem the switch didn't quite go off as well. I was just basically learning it as it was happening. We wiped a few times but in the end we tried a different strategy that worked the first time.

I was in the group for Thane Korth'azz and the strat was to have more dps stack this group and have just the tank a healer and a dps in the opposite group. We did that and on pull we killed the Thane before he even made the attempt to switch corners. That made getting down the other horsemen easier in the opposite corner from our group and thus easier to get the other 2 horseman down as well. In the process of getting down the last horsemen I ended up drawing aggro and tanking the last horsemen to the end. That was really cool as well great job by the raid as well with that strat.

We headed off to the rest of the Construct wing and oneshot Bosses Grobbulus and Gluth which was just as fun especially the Grobbulus fight. But in the end night ended at Thaddius with several attempts with a less than full raid. I was so tired I was barely awake. To be honest I was really tired as well tonight and somewhat relieved we didn't have a raid. I went took a nap and then I later spend most the time in Dalaran trying to find a JC to cut me a Champion Monarch Topaz gem for my new Pants so I could equip them and maintain my Meta gem bonus from my Helm by geming the pants.

Sometimes You Get Called - My First WotLK Raid, 25 Man Heroic Naxx

I wasn't expecting to be raiding as yet let alone tonight. Was just expecting to just work on some other seemingly boring thing. But my Guild GM Warrior friend gave me a friendly invite and nudged me to tag along anyway with the guild for the Heroic 25 Man raid of Naxxramas. MY UI wasn't really set up for Raiding either. But I guess you have to start raiding somewhere don't we all despite all things.

I have no clue as to how any boss or anything is in Naxx so it was all just seeing it for the first time. We had fun and I did as well. With 4 Tanks, 3 Paladins and a Warrior and rest of the raid we cleared all the Arachnid and the Plague Quarter bosses. I tanked Patchwrek almost to the very end when he went into a frenzy and all was going fine and just like that out of the blue I was face down with way less than 1% HP and rest of raid got him down a few seconds later. I guess with that I missed getting a Achievement.

I guess even though a bit over half my gear is still Blue its all enchanted and in tip top shape. Every bit of it made a difference tanking the entire boss fight. It was fun!


Being the much lesser geared Tank it didn't start off that I was going to tank Patchwrek. I think I shielded him 3rd but my threat cycle was just fast enough that I somehow outpaced the other 2 much better geared fellow guild P.Paladins and Patchwrek took a liking for me. So I ended up tanking him 99% of the fight.

Instructor Razuvious kicked our raids ass along with his 4 man DK crew. So we headed off to the Construct Quarter for Patchwrek.

This boss was fun whatever his name was. He dropped some nice loot but I really didn't have much to bit on anything. No worries though. Everything in its own time.

Not quite got that dance down yet. I was just moving wherever our Warrior tank moved, which can be a bit hard to anticipate. Maybe I should say I didn't quite understand the fight that's more like it as well. Need to head to the research department.



Was a long fun night. Got some DKP for the boss kills, picked up several Emblems of Valor. Saw some really nice gear drops for Plate. Our only Holy Paladin in the raid made out like a bandit on healing Plate which was all great for him. He's a awesome healer. But in the end I only bid on one item and got that so picked up Fleshless Girdle which dropped from Patchwrek. I really don't have much of any current gear with much blockrating as yet so was nice to pick up a gear piece and at least I now don't have to send 40 Emblems of Heroism on the other one. Kinda nice as well since I got to tank him the entire fight almost which didn't start out that way. I was just the undergeared tank along for Naxx 101 class. Fun night!