Down goes Arthas! Down goes Arthas!

< Fire and Blood > downed Arthas last night for the first time. I wasn't there. I was at a book signing. I have pretty mixed feelings on this. I'm extremely happy that my guild got past this hump. It did take the 10% buff for us to do it, as we spent the last four plus weeks wiping on him. But even with the buff its nice to have him down finally.

However, I'm sad that I missed it. Its there first big kill I havent been there for. Kael, Archimonde, Kil'jaeden, Maly, Yogg. I was there for them all. Ilidan, I sat myself for to give another player some time, but I was online and listening on vent when we downed him. This one I wasnt even home. It took only two tries, so they had a lot of time left, and went to Uldaur and killed Algalon for a guild first as well. Well Heroic Anub is still up. Maybe I need to miss more. :/

Glyph of Flame Shock

A quick update to my last post.
Rawr and Enhsim have been updated, and it appears that initial napkin math on Glyph of Flame Shock was wrong. In my current gear Glyph of FS appears to be about a 40 dps upgrade over Glyph of WF.

Patch 3.3.3

So the latest patch is today.

Not a lot for shaman

Elemental Combat

•Flame Shock: The damage-over-time component of this ability can now produce critical strikes and is affected by spell haste.
•Elemental Oath: This ability is now always on as a passive aura.
Enhancement

•Unleashed Rage: This ability is now always on as a passive aura.

The Flame Shock change is very nice. It should be a nice little dps increase. With enough haste it also makes a 1:1 FS:ES rotation more attractive. Its a very high abount of haste, 1269 along with having a Wrath of Air in the raid. However thats also with perfect reaction times, a bit of lag and a bit of reaction time slow down or GCD overlap, and quite often you will avoid clipping that last tick. It also makes Bizuri's Totem of Shattered Ice that much more attractive, as it will get to five stacks that much faster. I will be getting that next. I need 9 more frosties first.

One thing that wasnt mention in the patch notes is the Glyph of Frost Shock. The current version allows the dots to crit, but thats now baseline. The last version on the PTR that I'm aware of is this

Glyph of Flame Shock
The current (for us) Glyph of Flame Shock does something like let Flame Shock crit at 230% damage. We'll try to get a new patch note up soon. Whatever it ends up as will probably be some relatively simple damage buff to replace the old crit buff.

I have no idea if that stuck. Napkin math on that glyph buts it well behind WF for Enhancement.

ICC Nerfs are here

Ok they are technically a buff to players but it amounts to a nerf to the instance. Guilds have had a few weeks to down Arthas, and many have done so. Fire and Blood hasn't gotten very far into P2 yet. I'm actually in favor if this. I like the fights to be challenging. Blizzard wants them to be accessible. This way eveyone's at least somewhat happy. The hardcore get the exclusivity for a while, and eventually the more casual get to win too. I'd have preferred another couple of weeks before they implemented this, but you can't have everything. I'm also not sure that I like being able to click the buff off. I understand the desire, but will there be away to determine who beat it unbuffed vs. buffed? I can see the progression arguments already.

Also Blizzard has released a lot of info on Cataclysm stat changes. The conservative in me dislikes them on principle, but I'll take a wait and see approach. I'm just not liking a complete rework of the Enhancement class mechanics again.
http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/cataclysm-stat-system-changes/

Here is the big one for us

If you are a melee DPS class, druid tank, or hunter, expect to see:

•A lot more Stamina. Bear-form Stamina scaling will be lowered as a result.
•Strength if you wear plate. Agility if you wear mail or leather.
•Existing Attack Power becomes Agility and Stamina.Armor Penetration becomes Haste or Crit.
•No Intellect on melee gear. Hunters won’t need Intellect since they will no longer use mana. Shaman and Retribution paladins will get mana and spell damage in other ways.

The other ways is going to be interesting to see what they come up with. Right now i blow through mana like nobodies business. I oom a lot in 5 mans when aside from bosses everything dies to fast to use SR effectively.

Ironbounds

Well turnout was lackluster last night so rather than spend the evening wiping on Blood Queen, we headed back to Ulduar to finish up Glory of the Ulduar Raider

I don't care how much gear you have. 1 Light in the Darkness is a difficult fight. So now I'm the proud owner of an Ironbound Protodrake. I'm not a big one for achievements, especially one 2 tiers old, but I did want an Ironbound. Coolest mount this side of Ashes of Al'ar.


Also patch 3.3.3 PTR notes are out.
The only real Shaman change so far is this :

Shaman (Forums / Talent Calculator)

•Flame Shock: The damage-over-time component of this ability can now produce critical strikes and is affected by spell haste.

So if you are not already using Flame shock in your rotation, you really should add it now. The haste change reduce the chances of clipping, and even with out the dots ticking it was already a slight dps increase from all Earthshocks, now its even more so.

Changes to the flame shock glyph are incoming currently they are using this :
Glyph of Flame Shock
The current (for us) Glyph of Flame Shock does something like let Flame Shock crit at 230% damage. We'll try to get a new patch note up soon. Whatever it ends up as will probably be some relatively simple damage buff to replace the old crit buff. (Source)

I doubt it will be one that Enhancement will use, but still worth keeping an eye on.

Sindragosa Down

< Fire and Blood > downed the big dead dragon last night. We went for one last pull after official raid end time and down she went. We'd had a couple of close wipes including a 1% a couple of pulls prior, so we knew we had her. Just a matter of minimizing mistakes. Its a fun fight but also a bit frustrating with the constant debuff management. I was really concerned going into the fight as a hybrid, that I'd get both the melee and magical debuff, but I dont think I ever got the magic debuff, even when backing off and casting to let the melee debuff fall off.

Anyways this week we work on Arthas. Hopefully we can clear everthing fast enough to get a good look at him.

Earthliving?

Enhancement is my gig. Its what I enjoy about playing a Shaman. However, as I've complained about in previous posts the badge grind is how shall I put it?... A GRIND! I've never been one to pug, however with the new LFG tool, pugging has become if not enjoyable, at least convenient. Well aside from the tedious queue times at least. Baelor isn't a gatherer so I can't mine or herb while waiting. Fishing is a possibility I suppose, but the point is I don't want to wait 30 minutes to run a stupid pug. So I have been queueing as a healer. I know, I know... Baelor you say, you aren't a healer, you have no experience as resto. False! I healed BT on a fun run once time. I also healed Gundrak, or Drak Tharon.. I get confused. I healed the one with the T-Rex boss. So there!

Anyways. I've picked up a lot of resto gear over time, I've spent the gold to enchant it and gem it.. what the hell I might as well use it, and since queue times for healers are more like 20 seconds as opposed to 20 minutes... well I've actually been using my off-spec. Besides, unless I get one of the ICC instances, I can heal most of them using healing stream and earthshield. Toss in a riptide, and unless dps is standing in shit its a breeze.