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Just make sure you decline the invite so that I know that you're not coming. For the rest of you: We'll be finishing off Mimi, Vezax and working on Yogg-Saron....BE PREPARED!

For now the answer to that question is NO. I would have expected our raiders to follow up on their classes and spell rotation changes. Not all classes/roles need to respec. Despite the fact that epic gems have appeared, I would not expect our raiders to have everything regem immediately. That is completely unreasonable and postponing a raid for that doesn't seem like such a great idea. As far as the queue is concern, I can only hope that our raiders are a little more proactive and have try logging on in advanced. Lag we can do nothing about. If we get too much than we can cancel. With the new raids showing up, I think it's time we put our game faces on and really aim at completing Ulduar on both normal and hard modes!

So I've gotten into this bad habit of doing too many WoW-related things at work... I just spent an unbelievable amount of time trying to learn the ins and outs of Yogg-Saron and I have to say: Please go read up on this fight! There is just WAY too much crap going on in all 3 phases for folks to expect that they'll understand the mechanics of the fight after 1 night. If we want to speed up the learning process and not wipe on this guy for the next month, we REALLY need to have *EVERYONE* read up. This fight relies on *EVERYONE* doing their jobs!

Skip Ignis next week? Yes? No? Maybe?

You are correct Kailand. The site checks that the player has reached their hit cap INDEPENDENT of target debuffs. If I keep Misery up (+3% chance to hit) and Druze keeps his Improved Faerie Fire up (another +3% chance to hit) that means folks can save up to 6% on hit gear (or more depending on their talents). I can't speak for Druze, but I have no choice but to keep my debuffs up since they activate the second I start landing spells on the boss. If folks want to reduce their hit gear in consequence that's fine with me, however if you do so make sure you keep an eye on the WWS stats. If you're hitting targets I'm not than you're SOL in regards to my debuff. Ascoli has mentioned that the IBF ability will get nerfed to a 2min cooldown following the 3.2 patch. Going this route might not be sustainable. However, if Tyrandius has other abilities that could mean "no-kite Surges" than I'm still up for giving it a try.

I'm reading up on Vezax strategies... What are the pros and cons of having Tyrandius tanking Vezax instead of Holy? Could we avoid the kiting through Icebound Fortitude? Would our healers be able to keep up? Is this a viable strategy that could benefit us?

Audit Update I ran the audit again today here are the results: Evila -- Missing glove enchant (It's new gear so I'll likely let it pass), low spell hit 13.95% vs 17% that's a good 3.05% missing (not sure how important that is for Warlocks) Anamarie -- GOOD Druze -- GOOD Bralor -- GOOD (good job! Considering you had to work up your Hodir rep, I'm impressed!) Draegloth -- Low spell hit 14.22% vs 17% that's a 2.78% missing (not sure how important that is for Warlocks) Tizaria -- GOOD Zeniita -- GOOD Lorgan -- Can upgrade cloak enchant Sneekeh -- GOOD Markenhoof -- GOOD Ascoli -- GOOD (Caught in Prot gear -- I'll assume your Ret gear hasn't changed, it was good last time) Jestin -- GOOD Kelea -- GOOD Foroshell -- GOOD Karrock -- GOOD Holyssa -- GOOD Uglutz -- GOOD Orcala -- Missing shoulder enchant and head enchant seems wrong Kailand -- GOOD Tyrandius -- GOOD Kadiana -- GOOD Elrikk -- GOOD Zuworty -- GOOD Heiliger -- Caught in Ret gear...however since you should be DPSing most of the time this gear should be in MUCH better shape. 3 missing gems, 1 missing socket in your belt and 4 missing enchants. Your shoulders are for your Prot set and can have their enchant upgraded. You have not done ANYTHING yet to address these issues. Taidenewy -- GOOD Summary: You guys have done an AWESOME job improving your gear!!! Only the following people have stuff to resolve: Evila, Lorgan, Orcala and Heiliger (BIG TIME!).

The eye of Uglutz resists your penetrating gaze My penetration beats your resist!

I'm sold on the idea. I'd rather have Draegloth do it however, I want to enable and encourage Evila to do more DPS. On another topic... Assignments are up for the Flame Leviathan. General rule-of-thumb: If you are a tank or melee DPS you'll likely be in a Siege Engine. If you are a healer you are either driver a Chopper or a Devestator. If you are range DPS you are likely a Devestator Gunner. I did a bit more research...healers should NEVER find themselves inside a Shador Crash while fighting General Vezax. While the Crash puddle will buff range DPS, it will inhibit healers. Positioning in the Group Roster has been modified to reflect that.

Kalea -- GOOD Holy, just pop open a trade with me at the start of the raid and I'll take care of the enchant. That goes for everyone! If you're missing an enchant, I'll gladly fill 'er up until I run out of mats.

Audit Results So I performed an audit of our raiders today. I used the be.imba website which isn't great but at least gives me a good amount of data to parse through. I try not to make too many assumptions since sometimes what is deemed "proper" doesn't necessarily fit the situation. Also, not everyone logs out in their raid gear. Here are some of the results: Evila -- GOOD Anamarie -- GOOD Druze -- Can upgrade chest enchant Bralor -- Can upgrade shoulder and pant enchants (potentially cloak too, that would be specific to class/role) Draegloth -- GOOD Tizaria -- GOOD Zeniita -- Can upgrade weapon enchant Lorgan -- Can upgrade cloak enchant Hingon -- Can upgrade chest enchant and 8 low quality gems (yikes!) Markenhoof -- GOOD Ascoli -- GOOD Jestin -- Not sure why you have stam to boots, but I guess you die a lot so that's ok Kelea -- Unknown you logged out in your Elemental gear (However your enchants all look good! You set has low hit rating but that's expected I guess) Foroshell -- GOOD Karrock -- Missing chest enchant Holyssa -- Missing cloak enchant Uglutz -- Unknown you logged out in your Elemental gear (I can however upgrade your chest and cloak enchant which should help your DPS) Orcala -- WTF? PvP Set? I hope so! Kailand -- GOOD Tyrandius -- GOOD (Reports low spell hit 13% < 17% don't know if that matters) Kadiana -- GOOD (Reports you should have Vitality not Icewalker on your boots -- just FYI doesn't really matter) Elrikk -- GOOD Zuworty -- GOOD Heiliger -- Caught in Ret gear...however since you should be DPSing most of the time this gear should be in MUCH better shape. 3 missing gems, 1 missing socket in your belt and 4 missing enchants. Your shoulders are for your Prot set and can have their enchant upgraded. Taidenewy -- Can upgrade your chest enchant. (Reports low spell hit 13% < 17% don't know if that matters) Well I hope that helps a bit. There are a lot of upgradeable enchants. I suspect folks are not investing in top enchants because they don't think its worth it. However, if everyone made sure their gear was in top shape it'd make for a pretty significant improvement.

Uh...what? *gives soul-searching Kurinnaxx stare* In response to this and to all the other comments regarding replacements... We're not there yet! I simply want to make sure that everyone understands that: A) I'm committed to making this raid succeed, whatever the cost! This includes finding permanent replacements (and yes we have issues finding temp replacements, however we actually have folks waiting on the side lines for perm spots). B) Our current rate of progression does not justify such extreme action. C) Holy if you think I was referring to you than you re sorrily mistaken my friend I'm not sure what you mean by this. We NEVER had a tank or healer first gearing policy. We have 3 tanks (2 OTs) and 7 Healers, should I prioritize them? Assign an order of importance to each player? I think that's asking for more problems than it's worth. I typically view all healers as equal. I try to make sure that Holy and Tyr are well geared and I try to make sure Heiliger picks up a decent amount of DPS gear (since he should be spending most of his time on that). Your right, we have the right amount of DPS for succeeding at doing what we are now. However, we have a lot of content left to get through and increasing our performance (on all fronts) is an important part to succeeding. In my opinion... Tanks are mostly where they need to be and are performing well (well most are at least). Healers are performing well, but I admit to being a little ignorant in that department since Ug has been doing such a great job leading them. DPS on the other hand varies A LOT! We have folks doing awesome jobs (DPSing, staying alive, being reactive). We have folks who do ok jobs but are very consistent (which in my book is acceptable). We have a good handful of folks doing awful jobs (bad DPS, constantly dieing to stupid ###### and having very poor awareness). So why do I pick on DPS when we are doing well? Because I know that is where we can improve most. Already ahead of you, I was planning on doing this tonight. I think that at this point everyone has gotten their fun with the various vehicles, it's time we get a little more serious about this. Yes and no. Typically I'd aim for 2 attempts (in case the first attempt was a fluke failure). But it depends on how well we do... For example if on Attempt #1 we get the boss down to 50% and Attempt #2 we get him down to 20%, I'd be more inclined to try Attempt #3. If we do a decent Attempt #1 and only get the boss down to 80% than I wouldn't be so inclined to try again. It's a judgment call.

You're 100% right on that Uglutz. The truth is that there is a cost to replacing any one person in the raid. Instead of investing in that cost I typically try to approach the people in question. I make sure they are aware of the situation and suggest ways for them to improve. In most cases, improvement is seen a couple of weeks thereafter. However, old habits die hard and people fall back to their old behaviors. Hell, after this series of posts and the fallout chatter in TS, it wouldn't surprise me to see our performance suddenly improve (as if by magic). Consequently it makes it hard for me to stay true to my threats. When it comes to raiders, fixing is way better than replacing. My threats will eventually get ignored, folks will stop listening to them and no improvements will occur. I know this will happen and on that day the folks who've been complacent will find themselves without a raid spot. Once again I completely agree with you. But I also ask folks to be considerate, we're giving it a try and our timing might be off at first. Progress to Y-S is top priority. The greater shame here is we don't at least give it a try and see. I've stated many times that I don't want this to impact our regular schedule in Ulduar.

Let me put it in simpler terms... We have the gear. We have the raiders. Despite a few replacements here and there we have all that is needed to start pursuing this. I seriously doubt anyone would dispute those facts. Why do we fail? Because people don't pay attention. Because people have been carried for all this time. Because people would rather rely on others doing the homework for them. Because people don't want to farm for repair money, flasks and pots. Because people want automated raids, where they show up and do the exact same ###### every week without ever breaking the mold or striving to accomplish anything harder. Not since Vashj have we collectively tried at accomplishing something that involves really pushing *everyone's* limit. We constantly have to rely on the same dozen or so folks to carry the other half! Our raid seems to have an increased intolerance for wiping. The second we start doing a bit of head bashing, TS becomes a circus! Well guess what, wiping is an integral part of raiding and if someone can't handle it then they'll get replaced. Personally what I find hard to tolerate during those wipes, is that the cause *ALWAYS* seems to revolve around the same individuals. Hard Modes aren't meant to interfere with our schedule! And I'll try to manage our time to the best of my abilities to stay true to that. I will do whatever it takes to keep progressing the way we are now including *replacing players*. If I have to find us a new pally tank that keeps aggro, caster DPS that can put out numbers or melee that won't die to stupid ######, than so be it. ....and to be more specific on certain topics... Hard Modes != Achievments, just because you get an achievement doesn't mean that is the sole reason for pursuing it (as I've stated before). It would seem some folks have developed an acute allergy to all things achievement related. To put things clearly...We had a huge pow-wow in TS about folks not wanting to be perma-flasked during the raid. I was even considering be lenient on those folks, because the individuals in question are some of our first-class raiders. I was eventually swayed by the argument about group effort, and how everyone should put in the same raid investment (yada yada yada...). The people in question were more than happy to follow suit and adhere to the new policy. The irony here is that there are individuals screaming wolf about flasks when their ###### remains un-enchanted, un-gemmed and their skill level is mediocre at best. I'd love to see the kind of reactions we'd get from those folks when we put a microscope on them and start looking at their own inadequacies. Like I said we wipe not because of gear, not because of attendance but simply because of inadequate player skill. Do you *truly* think that a few more tokens or weapons are gonna make a night and day difference when we start Hard Modes? I think not! Better player discipline, improved awareness, increased skills and fight familiarity are what we need to succeed.

To add to my previous post regarding raid direction... Raid Groupings!!! Back in the SSC/TK days I used to prepare the raid roles and groupings for every boss fights. As time went on, I got lazy and raid leads took over the task. In order to be more proactive and hopefully help you guys figure out your roles a bit better I'm going to my old habits. You can find all the boss fights and relevant roles on the following spreasheet: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=p3P...fvqeg&gid=3 Please study and figure out what you need to be doing and when! Vault of Archivon I'm taking a bit of an executive decision here... Due to the limited benefit of doing VoA, this part of the raid will be cut off indefinitely. Spending the necessary 40min of raid time getting to and from Wintergrasp for the opportunity of gaining 1 (and if we're lucky, 2) pieces of gear simply isn't worth it. Since the loot dropped from the Emalon is both class and role specific in most cases it gets junked. VoA will remain a viable option if raiders can log on 20min earlier than raid start time OR if we are cutting the raid short OR if raiders are willing to pursue VoA after the raid end time. Zu

Here are some of the reasons we are starting on Hard Modes (there is no particular order to the points): - I'm introducing Hard Modes as a means of tapping into our unspent raid potential. - We are desperately racing through the starting bosses in an attempt to reach the ones that we're working on. If we opt to give an extra 5% or 10% effort instead of racing, we could potentially unlock better gear with minimal consequences to our schedule. If we find that a particular Hard Mode requires more effort than that, we'll move on, no harm done. - The goal is to complete Ulduar and then exclusively move on to Hard Modes. There is no reason why both of these goals cannot be pursued in parallel. If we wait till the very end before attempting Hard Modes we'll have missed on many good opportunities at learning and improving our battle tactics. - Some folks are totally uninterested in Hard Modes and are selfish enough to drop the raid once we consistently down Yogg. This approach prevents these folks from doing so. - The truth is that despite our progress our performance has degraded. Also, we have individuals who are WAY under performing. Hard Modes will enable us to continue improving ourselves and help us identify our weak links (and address them). And to address some of the concerns: - We will not bash our faces on a boss until we achieve a Hard Mode kill. We will give each boss a couple of "good" attempts and then move on. At the very least we will adapt our raid tactics to match those of the Hard Mode achievement without engaging Hard Mode. - The goal is to not "significantly" impact our schedule. If we fall too far behind than we will drop of the Hard Mode attempts. We will not however drop any attempts due to "stupid" wipes (i.e. people breaking CC on trash or tanks pulling too fast). - We are not pursuing Hard Modes for the sake of getting Achievements. While initially I figured that the auxiliary Achievements would be a good intro to Hard Modes, it turns out that wiping on ###### that give us little to nothing in return isn't really worth it and makes people cranky.

Hey folks, Just wanted to say that I'm really impressed with our progression lately. We've really been ramping up! Let's keep up with the good work, we'll be checking gear, gems, enchants and specs to make sure that everyone is maximizing their potential. So where do we go from here... HARD MODES!!! After discussing some of this with folks, here are the hard modes we will be pursuing in the very near future (i.e. starting this week). Flame Leviathan +2 Activation: Leave Hodir's tower standing. Fight Mechanics: - Increases boss' health - Causes white beams to follow players around - The beams will fire a frost attack damaging players and entombing them (until freed by fire damage) Strategy: - We must improve our player catapult/pick-up rotation - Devastors MUST use their Pyrite (which also means they must remain stocked up) - We must have a better rotation between catapulting players and filling the Devestator's Pyrite supply - Siege Engines must make better use of their Eltroshock disrupting ability Where we Fail: - Folks in Siege Engines don't interrupt using Electroshock - Folks in Siege Engines suck at pre-emptively running away - Folks DPSing turrets are not DPSers - Folks DPSing turrents don't know how to use healthstones to stay alive - Folks in Devestators don't know how to use their Pyrite or can't stay stocked up XT-002 Activation: We must kill the heart (it has 7M health, takes double dmg and stays out for approximately 20s) Fight Mechanics: - Boss damage increased by 15% - Health healed to full and increased by 60% - No longer summons adds - Gravity Bombs leave massive void zones that kill ppl - Light Bombs leave a spark that damages the entire raid Strategy: - Entire raid will have to group up in roughly the same spot - People with Gravity Bombs run left or right - People with Light Bombs run left or right -> Sparks must be Tanked & DPS'd ASAP (Nature resist helps) Where we Fail: - People don't move fast enough once they get a debuff Video: Hodir Activation: None required -- we just need to kill him fast enough Fight Mechanics: - He doesn't do anything different, we just got to change the way we kill him Strategy: - Tank Hodir in back right corner -- allows NPCs to congregate, simplifies releasing them - Prioritize NPCs -- Mages and Shamans - Players must actively seek buffs -- in particular the critical strike buff given by the Shaman NPCs - We'll split range DPS into 2 groups so that we can maximize the spread of buffs Where we Fail: - We don't have enough DPS Video: Freya +1 Activation: Leave Elder Brightleaf standing. Fight Mechanics: - Increase magic damage dealt by Freya and her adds (by 60%). - Gives Freya the ability to nuke players and nearby targets. Strategy: - No change to our previous tactics, we simply need to be more careful - This is increases stress on healers Where we Fail: - Players stand on top of green seed on P2 and die - Players DPS adds randomly and fail at killing them within 10s of each other - Healers fail GEAR CHECKS!!! All players have till Thursday to perform the following tasks: - Make sure all gear is properly enchanted - Make sure all gem slots are filled - Make sure all gear/talents/specs are up to snuff If you fail to comply it's a -10DKP per missing gem, enchant or inappropriate talent. We have players falling behind in their numbers, please make sure you maximize your DPS/heals/tanking. Players fulfilling 2 roles (i.e. Tanking and DPSing) are not excluded from this requirement. Being an OT is not an excuse for poor DPS on fights where you do absolutely no tanking. Runed Orb Policy Change!!! We have only a few people who haven't yet received their set of Orbs for their first item. Once that requirement is fulfilled we will no longer be supply folks with a full 6 Orbs for their second items. We will be giving only 3 orbs and it is up to the player to buy, trade or use badges to obtain the last 3. So I hope this serves as a bit of a motivator for people. See you all at tomorrow's raid. Zu

A few loose ends: Mind Control /w Focus Macro: As requested here is the macro I use for Mind Control (note that this macro is useful for all kinds of other spells as well): #showtooltip Mind Control /clearfocus [modifier:alt][target=focus,dead][target=focus,help][target=focus,noexists] /focus [target=focus,noexists] /cast [target=focus]Mind Control You can also add in something to announce to raid your intention: /raid Cast Mind Control on %f Designated Offspec Players: So I'm very happy with the progress we've been making lately, it's unfortunate we're having a few issues with Thorim. However, our current problems highlight the need for us to be way more dynamic. We currently run with 7 healers, 3 tanks and 15 DPSers. Not all fights require that precise make up, and I feel that we could potentially progress much quicker if we took better advantage of dual specs. What does this mean? It means I want select players to be able to switch to/from tanking to DPS and to/from healing to DPS. Being able to fulfill 2 roles adequately is no small request. I need folks that have a VERY GOOD GRASP on the abilities, dynamics and talents of their class. In exchange for taking on more responsibilities and helping towards progression these people would get first dibs on any offspec loot. (Hence these folks will have to do twice the work to figure out what is required for their dual spec and make sure they keep an eye open for the loot that will help them fulfill both roles). I need the following volunteers: - 1 mail wearing healer - 1 leather wearing healer - 1 cloth wearing healer (I got Tiz volunteering, anyone else want to be considered?) - 1 plate wearing tank (can't be Holy since he's MT) Anyways, it's a concept I think we help us progress better in the long run. I hope my explanation is clear enough. It does affect the looting rules somewhat, so I hope people don't get too sensitive about it. Thorim I'm happy to see all the positive feedback people are giving in regards to this fight. Generally speaking I think we're progressing well, but our Arena team needs much improvement. - Kailand is right this is a DPS race, but at the end of the day straight up DPS might not be what we need - I fear that unless we find a better strategy for dealing with Evokers, more DPS won't be the solution So to recap here are some of the suggestions people have proposed: 1) Interrupts 2) Slow / Inhibit heals 3) Dispel / Purge 4) Prioritization / Focus fire 1) Interrupts I think that if you can interrupt, then you should try to keep an eye out on those Evokers. Something that was suggested to me (and works REALLY well for this fight) is to make use of the Tauren racial ability War Stomp. These aren't bosses, so the stomp is a great ability that could allow us to catch up (we also have 2 or 3 Taurens in the middle that could do this). 2) Slow / Inhibit Heals There isn't much we can do here. This is really Elrikk's and our Warlocks' department. Curse of Tongues is your friend. I understand that Elrikk is a HUGE help here, but it's not fair to him nor to raid if we MUST have him in order to get pass this fight (putting the fate of our progression on 1 person, is not viable). 3) Dispel / Purge Try to keep up the good work Zen. I think if we can swap either a priest or shaman to DPS, we can increase our dispel/purge count. 4) Prioritization / Focus Fire Considering we are falling behind (seemingly due to Evoker heals) then perhaps we should prioritize them. This is a double edge sword, because if Warbringers accumulate than the Evokers get more and more difficult to deal with (since their heal cast times get significantly shorten). Anyways, we'll play around with it some more when we get there. Skipping Bosses Tonight will be the first night we will start skipping bosses. We're starting with Razorscale and Iron Council. There seems to be a crap ton of ppl needing stuff off of Ignis still.

Please update the spreadsheet and add Rune Edge for me off of council. K Done.

All the loot lists, Runed Orb list and reageant distribution order are written down on a Google spreadsheet. You can ask the spreadsheet at this link here: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=p3P...zjNGwDeY2Mfvqeg OR You can go read the first post in this thread and there's a link to the roster (it's the SAME link)

I'm liking forcing folks to give me loot list. I can see that people are trying to put an effort in coming up with an upgrading strategy. I might even consider extending looting rules in such a way for all bosses....discuss BTW Karrock, you were position #8 for the boots, but since I'm taking those off, I bumped the belt to position #8.

READ UP ON VEZAX YOU NEWBS!

Ok guys, to stress the fact that we are aiming for progression and will be cutting out the optional bosses here is what's happening in terms of loot: Folks who have supplied me with a list of items they would like to have or need to have will automatically get priority in the distribution regardless of their DKP standing. The above rule is important because I want the loot to go to the people who have put an effort in determining what is best for their class/role. So please don't postpone in providing me with this information!

I wasn't thinking we'd actually skip her. But in the event where it would be convenient too, it's good information to know.

All the crap I need is off the bosses we havent beat yet... oh and will we have enough orbs for my boots on Thursday? Gotta keep my dps up there! I sent you the orbs! Check your mail you newb! Also...by the looks of it we'll start skipping some of those initial bosses sooner rather than later.