Category Archives: instances

instances, screenshots

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Shadow Labs Runs

14 Comments


Really the only thing I can add to these pictures is: “You should’ve heard me on Vent.”

I’ll put Savagery on it tomorrow; no enchanters seemed to be on tonight. I’m at a point right now where my crit is over 20% unbuffed so I think I could use the attack power more than an agility enchant. Though agility will always be my one and only favorite stat. Because I love my crit. But I’m trying to stay balanced.

In other news, I did SM Library on my level 38 hordie hunter. With a 33 warrior tank and a 34 shammy healer. And… that was it. Just us. We three-manned it. We originally had two other party members but they disconnected and disappeared right at the beginning of the run and we… just decided to keep going. It was pretty awesome. I love instances. I love the challenge of them and the rush of doing them, and the whole way you have to coordinate yourself with other people. It’s so weird that I’ve come to enjoy that kind of thing because I’ve always been one of those flying-solo-types. And not just in WoW.

Said to me today: “A hunter who can trap. I think I love you.” You heard me ladies. Freezing traps get all the men. Now you know the secret. =P

instances

Instance-Running Machine

11 Comments

Well, after a lull of a week or two where Tawyn was sort of stabled from instances and focusing on PvP and working on trade skills, the instancing appears to be back in full swing.

Yesterday I did both Shadow Labs and Botanica. The Shadow Labs run wound up being horribly ironic because everyone in the group was running it for gear, and not a single piece of gear for any of us dropped… that includes the ever-so-elusive Sonic Spear. However, I did receive a visit by one Bremm in the middle of this instance, so that was pretty awesome. /wave

Botanica we were running for the second half of the Arcatraz key. Our group also had slightly better luck on this one gearwise; I actually didn’t come out of the instance with anything for myself (a pretty good neck piece dropped, but the rogue and I decided we would roll for it and he won, which I’m glad for, because he deserved it)… but the quest turn-in did bestow a pretty snazzy new belt upon me. Not to mention the Arc key! We’ll hopefully be running that at some point today.

One of my favorite parts of the instance-running, though, was this: there’s a boss in Shadow Labs who mind-controls the party (I can’t remember the name of this boss). The problem for us was that when he does this, the tank seems to lose aggro. So we came up with a plan: after the next mind control, I was to misdirect onto the tank. The next mind control pops up and by the time it’s over the boss is chasing the rogue around– probably another hit and the rogue would be down.

Here comes Tawyn to save the day!

Misdirect on the tank… pulling back the bowstring… and… BAM!

Aimed Shot Crit Misdirect. Oh yeah!

Boss runs back over to the tank, rogue survives, and we finish the guy. I felt pretty awesome.

My next moment of personal heroism was the last boss in Botanica. Right towards the end– boss had maybe 6% of his HP left… everybody wound up dying except for the tank and I, and we managed to finish him off. But to be honest there were a lot of little moments of heroism from everybody throughout the instances, not just me. It was really great.

I also felt good because at some point everybody started complimenting me for my traps. “Tawyn, I have no idea how you do your traps like that, but you’re pretty much the only hunter I will ever group with.” Stuff like that. /blush. Even though I still think my trapping could use some improvement, but I think I’m getting better with all the practice I’ve been doing lately.

I promise I’m going to post about something other than instances soon. =P

battlegrounds, instances, pvp, thoughts

Gettin' Stuff Done

5 Comments

Getting started on a new exercise regime is a daunting prospect. You know it’ll hurt, you know you’ll have to drag yourself there on occasion and the prospect of spending your time sweating among all those toned and muscled Adonises is quite an intimidating one. So follow our top 10 tips for those gym beginners among you and you’ll find your workout goes without a hitch. For more information about fitness supplements visit sfgate.com.

JOIN ONLINE Book Online

SET REALISTIC GOALS

It may take some time to get the results you want. It’s vital to break your ultimate goal down in to stages and set lots of smaller goals to keep you motivated along the way.

BE CONSISTENT

Results come through regular and consistent activity. Stick to your programme and avoid frequent stops and starts.

TOO MUCH TOO SOON

Do not increase the amount of exercise you do too soon. Increase what you’re doing by no more than 10% per week.

ACCEPT FEELINGS OF DISCOMFORT

When you first start exercising you’ll experience feelings of discomfort such as shortness of breath, sweating and aching muscles after exercising. Don’t worry, this is completely normal and everyone feels like this when they’re first starting out.

TRAIN WITH A FRIEND

Training with a friend not only keeps you motivated during the sessions themselves but will also make you less likely to miss a planned session as you’re unlikely to want to let down your friend.

WARM UP

Not warming up is a mistake many beginners make. Before any session ensure that you warm up thoroughly and mobilise the areas that you will be using during the workout. Furthermore, failure to warm up properly may increase the risk of injury.

TIME OF DAY

We are all different. Some of us rise early and some of us go to bed late. Exercise at the time when you feel that you have most energy.

WILL POWER

Don’t give up. All beginners have set backs on the way to achieving their goals. Accept them and use them to re-motivate yourself.

WATER

Ensure you drink plenty of water, before, during and after exercise, particularly if you are exercising in warm conditions or for long periods. Dehydration will result in a drop in performance and severe dehydration can be dangerous too.

TRY SOMETHING NEW

Keep things interesting by trying new exercises, workouts and activities to keep your programme fresh, keep challenging your body and preventing boredom.

instances, stories

Good Hunters go to Heaven, Except They Don't Die

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So I had the rather, um, unique experience yesterday of surviving a wipe. Basically it goes like this:

We were in Black Morass, which none of us had ever done before. This is a very… unusual instance. It consists of you running around killing bosses and other non-boss big elites, while trying to prevent wave after wave of mob from getting to Medivh. Very intense.

Anyways, we were about halfway through and doing okay, for it being everyone’s first try. I was on add-duty, so while everybody else focused on the elites I got to run around with Track Dragonkin up, making sure nobody was trying to sneak past. Anyways to make a long story short, we were busy on one of the bosses and then it happened. Tank died. Warlock died. Rogue died. Healer died. …hunter and pet are running around attacking the growing number of adds. I was fully expecting to die any second, but… nope. You see, I hadn’t touched the boss at all because I’d been focusing on adds. So I had no threat when it came to him, so he wasn’t touching me.

Furthermore, the adds weren’t mobbing me because they were all focused on Medivh. I was able to run around and pick them off one at a time– or at least make a futile attempt to do so before Medivh’s shield fell.

Medivh’s shield was, in fact, falling faster and faster and suddenly I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to be trying. Maybe I should die while his shield was still up… maybe then we wouldn’t have to start over?

I said in party chat: “Hey guys, I’m still alive”.

Party Chat: “…”

Me: “Am I supposed to die?”

Party: “Is Medivh’s shield falling?”

Me: “Yeah”

Party Chat: “Yeah… maybe dying would be a good idea…”

Okay, suicide. I can do that easily enough. I ran up to the boss they were fighting before and fired an arrow at him. Boss yells something out and charges at me and hits me for a lot of HP, but I was still hanging in there. I braced myself for the final blow…

And then he disappeared.

Medivh’s shield had fallen and so all the bad guys had disappeared.

Everyone had wiped and I’d ran up and shot an elite dragon boss in the face and yet my pet and I were still standing, battered, but alive.

Let me tell ya, I never thought I’d see the day where I could say that.

As for the instance, we tried a few more times unsuccessfully (the instance does in fact reset) and then decided we would call it a night and come back later when we needed the Kara key and when our tank was better geared. (Very good tank… needs better gear.)

I think it’s starting to turn into a joke among my guildies that I have this mysterious tendency to survive wipes. I am perfectly fine with that reputation.

gear, instances

Tawyn's a Happy Hunter

8 Comments

To start out with an update on my custom avatars; basically I’ve looked into it and I’ve run into some problems involving the legality of selling them because they’re renditions of Blizzard’s property. Yes, you could argue that I’m just a small little bug compared to their big corporation, but I dunno, I’ve been big Blizz fans since my StarCraft obsession phase almost ten years ago so I’d like to play it safe when it comes to my relationship with them. =P

I did get a lot of interest in my avatars though and I’m still sort of trying to come up with a way to offer them without making them entirely free, simply because while I’d love to give them away for free, the fact of the matter is that it takes a few hours to make each one and it’d be difficult to squeeze them into my time. One of my ideas is maybe setting up a little charitable drive, sort of like The Bronze Kettle did, only not on as big a scale. But I’ll keep brainstorming and keep you guys updated. If you were interested in an avatar I apologize for keeping you waiting on any final decisions.

Anyways, let’s discuss WoW.

Yesterday, I ran both Steamvaults and Shadow Labs.

Steamvaults dropped a very nice [Beast Lord Mantle] for me, which I promptly gem’d up and threw a Scryer inscription on.

Shadow Labs… well, I was praying to the hunter gods for Sonic Spear, especially because our motley crew had to endure several hours of pain in this particular instance (we went through three different tanks, one of which decided to leave the party without saying a word… and Grandmaster Vorpil… oh Grandmaster Vorpil… *shudders* … we wiped on this guy no less than five times)… so yeah, Sonic Spear would’ve been an awesome consolation prize but it appears that the hunter gods have more Shadow Labs runs for me in the future. I did, however, get the first fragment of the Kara key.

So! Not content with that outcome, I headed to the Auction House and bought myself both [Breastplate of Rapid Striking] and [Crystalforged War Axe]. Then I bought all the mats for Savagery and got the latter enchanted with that. My wallet is getting pretty thin and I’ve got some farming ahead of me but mmm. My un-buffed agility is now 434 and my crit is 18.85%. You should see me with Mark of the Wild and Blessing of Kings. Mmmmm. *eyes glaze over*

Ahem, sorry.

I think I’m doing okay for a pre-Kara hunter. I’m slowly replacing my greens with blues and getting enchants for them. Expensive? Yeah. Worth it when I open up my character sheet and see my stats? Oh yeah.

I’ve got more Steamvaults and Shadow Labs runs ahead of me, because I’d like the other piece of Beast Lord that you can get in SV (decreased trap cooldown… mmm hunter gear is yummy, no?), and because I’d still like Sonic Spear if I can nab it.

Oh, and /wave at Mirshalak and Pelides, both of whom have now made characters on Silver Hand to say hello! I owe you both a visit on your servers now. =P

Since I’m getting more visitors that way, I figured it’d be good to mention a few things. Firstly you are more than welcome to say hi to me and chat it up with me, so long as I’m not in battlegrounds or an instance. =D If I’m bored or not doing much I’ll even come find you “in person” and we can have a little visit.

If you would like to make a more dedicated alt on Silver Hand, to try out RPing or whatever, I should mention that while our guild Entelechy is usually open to anyone interested in having a good time with some fun (and just a bit weird) people, doing some instances, and casual roleplaying, our recruitment is sort of semi-closed at the moment due largely to rapid growth and wanting to concentrate on our current members, so I can’t guarantee you a spot in the guild if you’re interested in one. Besides, very, very few people in my guild know I have this blog anyway. Partially ’cause I’ve never really had a reason to bring it up, and partially because there are a lot of very good players in my guild, both hunters and non-hunters, and I wouldn’t want to steal anybody’s limelight by being “the one with the blog”. Heehee =P

Oh, and you are also more than welcome to try and catch me horde-side on The Venture Co. as well. My main character there is Lunapike, and I play her a few times a week, usually in the mornings. The Venture Co. seems to have more RP going on than Silver Hand (admittedly, Silver Hand isn’t exactly known as a mecca for RP), so you might want to try that out if you’re curious.

Today’s question that I pose to you: where do you do your farming? …and no, you don’t have to give away your super-secret location to me, if you don’t want to. =P

groups, guild, instances

Instances and Groups

6 Comments

The other day I wound up in a partial-PuG and partial-guildies group for Steamvaults. This was probably not a wise idea for many reasons, including the fact that it’s a level 70 instance and we were all hovering around level 68, and as it turned out… the PuG members were rather… less than ideal.

I went into it really wanting to do a good job, because the healer whispered me and begged me to be a good hunter, he told me that the last five or so hunters he’d grouped with had been horrible. So of course, this is where Pike’s HUNTER-PRIDE ACTIVATED! And I told him not to worry. But it just wasn’t meant to be. We were wiping on every other pull, we were having issues with the PuG’d people, gigantic annoying plants kept blocking everybody’s vision, and overall it just wasn’t working. So we scrapped the run.

We still wanted to do an instance, though, so we said goodbye to the PuG-players and picked up people from our guild to flesh out our little party. This particular party now was one that we had all been in many times before– our usual tank, our usual healer, and I as the usual CC, etc. We decided to do Escape from Durnholde Keep.

How was the instance run? Well, by most standards, I think, it went pretty well. We had a couple problems and a couple wipes (one of which was entirely my fault, by the way; it involved me not paying attention and running blindly around a corner straight into a bunch of mobs) and a couple near-wipes, but overall the run went well; all the group members were fulfilling their role’s function to above-satisfactory levels and for the most part, everything went smoothly.

However, we all left the instance feeling sort of less-than-satisfied and thinking we could have done a lot better.

It was kind of odd, but then I thought about it and I started thinking: maybe it’s just the fact that our group has worked together so many times before. We’ve grown a sort of synergy with each other, and developed high expectations of each other, and acknowledge that there are high expectations on us as individual group members; so when a run isn’t 100% flawless, we sort of beat ourselves up over it. That’s my guess over why we felt so unsatisfied.

I’m still trying to decide if those high-expectations are a good thing for a guild or group to have, or if it might cause issues down the road if everyone is striving for “that perfect run” and it is always a little bit out of our reach. We are a very laid-back social and light-roleplaying guild, but we also have a core group of higher-level instance-running members and our expectations for instance-running people are pretty high. I hope that’s the right attitude to have and that it doesn’t cause problems later on. I can’t say, because this is my first time around, so I can really just hope.

Anyways, I hit level 69 last night. It’s very surreal how close I am to 70…

Oh, and before I forget: Escape from Durnholde Keep is the coolest instance idea ever. I ran around Old Hillsbrad for about a half hour after the instance was done, geeking out over the lore.

instances, memes

Wipes. Not the Baby Kind.

6 Comments

I have been tagged by Bremm to share my five “worst wipes”. Unfortunately I fear that, largely because I have only been playing for seven months… well, I don’t have two years’ worth of wipes to draw on. So some of these are rather less than exciting, but are more… “You had to be there” types of moments.

Five Worst Wipes Meme
-invented by Pelides

1. Dire Maul: We were near the end of this instance, in some gigantic room and we had to get to a little circular area in the middle to fight a boss. The other four members of the party got there just fine, but I was loitering around for some reason. Finally they informed me that I should join them, so I headed towards them… and ran into a patrolling mob. Okay, one patrolling mob, I can handle it, especially since my fellow group members can help me… oh wait, there’s another mob… and another… and another…

…and we wiped, thanks to me not listening and following my groupmates fast enough.

(Actually now that I think about it this may have only been a semi-wipe; I think me and a couple other people died but not everyone.)

2. Sunken Temple: So… that room where you have to summon the dragon god and there’s all those mobs trying to stop you, as you gather items from them to put out the four fires? The first time I did this room, nobody in our group knew you were supposed to do that. The putting-out-the-fires thing, that is. We fought wave after wave of nonstop mobs for ten or fifteen minutes and died a very slow and painful death thanks mostly to eventually running out of mana and having all our good stuff on cooldown. I still shudder just thinking about that room, despite the fact that I’ve done it successfully since then.

3. Underbog: There’s a sort of dragon-type boss whose name I can’t remember; he’s standing on a big ledge, really high above some water. The first time my group ran this, it didn’t occur to us that the boss could push you off the edge. So there we were, starting the boss, expecting your typical tank’n’spank and suddenly the tank was gone. One minute he was there, the next… *poof*… no more tank. The “Uh…”‘s in party chat were met with the tank’s reply, “He pushed me off into the water” about a second before the rest of us turned into dragon food, still with silly looks of mystification on our faces I’m sure.

Now whenever we fight this boss, we pull him to the wall first. No more disappearing tanks for us!

4. Dire Maul, Again: I mentioned this a couple posts back. Basically I jumped off a ledge, forgetting a little minor detail: my pet. A few minutes later, in the midst of minding our own business, Locke runs up with more elite mobs than I’ve seen in my life hot on his tail. Our whole party was squashed basically before I could blink. It was embarassing but oh-so-hilarious.

5. Zul’Farrak: We aggro’d one of the scarabs. Enough said.

So, there ya go! I tag… whoever wants to do it! (I’m not very good at this tagging thing.)

Oh, and ding 67… yes, ignore my Armory profile and the banners on my blog that are dependent on my Armory profile. The Armory hasn’t updated my character in a week now, and I’ve no idea why (especially since my guildies are getting updated just fine…)

duels, instances, stories

Bad Hunter, Good Hunter

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Some of my adventures around Azeroth…

Bad Hunter:

-I jumped off a high ledge in Dire Maul. Guess who I forgot to dismiss? Mmyep. About three minutes later, in the middle of discussing strategy, my pet comes running up followed by basically every single mob in the instance. Admittedly those last two seconds before we died were pretty funny (I’ve never seen that many mobs), and the group I was with was very forgiving and reminded me that it was sort of a hunter rite-of-passage… but I still was pretty embarrassed.

-I helped out a group in Scholo so one of the group members could get his pally mount, and another could progress in her warlock mount chain. Not too long into the instance I made a terrible mistake, clicked on the wrong mob, and without noticing, hit my “Hunter’s Mark/Pet Attack” macro key. This proceeded to pull basically the entire room. We managed to survive somehow, but I was beating myself up for it and making it worse was the fact that the PuG-members of the group assumed I was a huntard and started telling me to dismiss my pet. I apologized, told them it was my fault and not the pet’s, and that it wouldn’t happen again and that my pet was staying out whether they liked it or not. I’m hoping they noticed that my pet was very well-controlled for the rest of the instance and that I topped the damage meters pretty squarely. Normally I don’t like to flaunt the DPS meters but I really wanted to prove to them that I actually was competent and had just made a bad mistake. (And no I didn’t actually post the damage meters, but I’m hoping they noticed =P)

Good Hunter:

-This story takes place during another Scholo run (I help lower-level guildies in lower-level instances a lot). We were doing one of the boss rooms, the pull hadn’t turned out as we’d liked, and to make a long story short the entire room was on top of us.

It was pretty obvious that a wipe was imminent as I watched the group members fall one by one, so I took out as many mobs as I could before I was alone and overwhelmed. I ran out of the room, put my pet on defensive instead of passive (so he at least wouldn’t go down without a fight) and feigned death.

Poor Locke, I thought, I’m going to be sitting here playing dead while he dies…

But wait, what’s this?

Hey, Locke is doing pretty good against those three mobs (one of which was an elite) that are on him. He wouldn’t live without heals and help, but still…

I got up, bandaged up, popped Mend Pet, took out one of the mobs, trapped another, and then proceeded to solo the 60 elite.

So there we were, my pet and I standing triumphant in the face of what was otherwise a wipe. It was here that I noticed party chat was filled with people saying things like “Okay, wait for the mobs to be reset… whoa, what the heck, Tawyn’s not dead yet?” “Tawyn’s still not dead?”

And then I said “Hey guys, I killed an elite for ya”, not really thinking much of it, but then party chat proceeded to say “…um, Tawyn killed the boss.”

…I did?

Apparently I did!

He was a few levels lower than me yes. But he was an elite, and he had buddies with him, and I took him down.

And that made me feel really awesome.

-I defeated an equal-level marks-spec’d hunter in a duel. I still had about half of my hit points left by the end of it, too. Looking back on it I can think of some things he did wrong, for example, not sending his pet in to attack me (granted I would have trapped it anyway, but it’s the principle of the thing, ya know?) But it’s funny because I always had this notion in my head that marks-hunters did a lot better in duels. So this was another one of those “feel-good” moments.

The Morals of the Stories:

– Dismiss your pet before you jump off a ledge.

– Be absolutely sure you know who you are targeting before you send your pet in.

– Don’t assume you’ve lost when you’re staring in the face of an instance wipe or a duel against a differently-spec’d hunter. You never know when things will conspire to give you the edge you need.

Oh, and lastly…

– Don’t tell a good hunter what to do with their pet. Suggestions, okay. But “I hate your pet, please dismiss him”… no. Not a good idea. We have a thing called Huntery Pride and it comes out in full-force sometimes, and you probably don’t want to mess with it. *nods*

instances

Good Instance Runs: Chicken Soup for the WoW-playing Soul

9 Comments

I have to admit I don’t do a lot of instances. It’s not because I don’t want to do them, so much as because I often don’t have the time for them. I tend to be the busiest or the most likely to frequently AFK during the prime instance-running hours: the evening. So oftentimes I opt out of doing instances because I don’t want to bother the others with any potential frequent BRBs.

Today, however, was Thanksgiving, so I had a lot of wonderful uninterrupted spare time. (And don’t worry, I spent a lot of time with my family as well! =P My mom is a great cook.)

So, I ran Hellfire Ramparts. Twice. The group consisted of guildies and friends, mostly at level 60 (though I was at level 64), and included a warrior tank, a tree druid healer, a feral druid, and two BM hunters.

And I had an absolutely fantastic time, both times. The warrior had never done much tanking before and was very nervous about the whole thing, but he wound up doing a very impressive job. The healer was a great healer. The feral druid was one dangerous kitty. The other hunter was one of the best hunters I have worked with so far, and I’d like to think that I’m not too shabby either.

My job was DPS + CC, and it was one of the first times that I was really asked to provide consistent CC throughout the duration of a dungeon rather than just a few times. The other hunter and I actually played off of each other really well here; sometimes my trap would be resisted and she would be right there with a backup trap, or vice-versa. But what I really felt proud about were the times I had to chain trap. Sure, I’d practiced with the raptors in Arathi a la BRK, but here I was being asked to do it in a much more crucial setting. I guess I shouldn’t have worried because I seemed to do pretty good job, and that culminated in my sudden development of a severe case of “I’m-turning-into-a-real-hunter-itis”, a horrible disease that causes one to gesture frantically at the screen and tell one’s significant other “I’m chain trapping! I’M CHAIN TRAPPING! Are you watching??”

Heehee.

I also got to pull, at the warrior’s request. Oh, and the healer healed my pet whenever he was offtanking (or saving the healer). Both these people actually have level 70 hunters already so that may have helped.

Overall it was a fantastic experience. I feel like I learned a lot, and it felt really good to exit the instance knowing we’d done so well and handled the problems we’d came across. I got myself some new gear, and then because I was feeling particularly giddy I threw down a bunch of gold on an agility enchant for my polearm. At level 64, my agility is now over 400 and my crit chance is now over 15%, and I am one happy little hunterling.

I’m going to start trying to do more instances.

Happy Thanksgiving to those of you in the States!