Well, it's nearing the end of the week, I'm a little bored, and I'm in an exceptionally good mood, so I decided to share with you the source of my joy (no, not my paycheque - the other source). Forgive me if this does not interest you in any way :)
Last night my guild, Tempest Dawn, killed Hakkar for the first time.
This was a great morale booster for us for the following reasons: Until a few weeks ago we were (founding) members of a raiding alliance called Nexus, along with three other guilds. We had cleared ZG and had MC on farm up to Domo and had downed Ragnaros a couple of times. But there were problems. Personal feuds, power struggles, arguments about the speed of progression, accusations of favouritism were all souring what had once been a friendly raiding group. One other guild in particular were staring to dominate what was supposed to be an alliance of equals, and despite the best efforts of officers the problems could not be resolved.
So, we discussed it among ourselves, had meetings, took a vote, and eventually left to start raiding from scratch on our own. It wasn't an easy decision as it involved a lot of us taking several steps back in terms of content. We lost quite a few players in the process, including a couple of officers, as they chose to stay with Nexus and push on to BWL.
It was a difficult time for us. Bosses we were used to killing with ease started presenting a challenge, as new members, raiders and raid leaders learned the ropes. We were struggling to fill the slots for ZG. However, the atmosphere was infinitely better, with a feeling of camaraderie we'd been lacking before.
Pretty soon though, we had the Snake, Bat and Spider bosses on farm status, and were regularly killing the raptor too. We struggled a little with the Tiger at first, but after a few hints from a friend in a high-end guild, he too started going down without a wipe.
It was the panther where we really stalled, and where tensions began to run high. An influx of new raiders from a disbanding guild joined us, and we started to feel a divide between these new members and the rest of us. They had different tactics, different leaders, and some struggled to accept directions believing that their own ways were best. Hostility between tanks and healers started to develop as people started blaming each other for deaths. We tried every tactic we could think of in our mission to kill Arlokk, but night after night we failed.
Until last night. Following a particularly successful Tuesday run in which the first four priests died without a hitch, we were ready to face her once more. I don't know what we did differently this time. Maybe our class balance was better, maybe our confidence was high, maybe we just got lucky? Whatever the deciding factor, the Panther priestess died on our first attempt. We were ready to face Hakkar!
It wasn't an easy fight. Although some of us had killed him before we had many members who had never beaten him, and many who had never even been that far. Our problems came from mind controlled warriors fearing half the raid, Sons of Hakkar not being killed in time to poison us, tanks running out of range of their healers, people being out of mana, and so on. Our first attempt of the night took him to 64%, and our second to 30%. We were definitely improving. Our third fight failed to prove lucky, as we were forced to reset at 14%.
Harsh words were exchanged between certain warriors and the healing team, a few people started to mutter about how they really had to leave, but eventually we agreed to have one final push. And we were so glad we did! The big weird snake-bird-thing finally died, leaving our GM with Peacekeeper Gauntlets, a happy warrior with Bloodsoaked Legplates, and a certain druid (*cough*me*cough*) with Heart Of Hakkar, which I will be exchanging for a nifty little tanking trinket.
I'm hoping that this success will bring the guild closer together. Now we know that we can work as a team, we're all feeling much more confident in our own, and each other's, abilities. MC here we come!
- Forums
- World of Warcraft
- General Discussion
- Hakkar down! One guild's adventures in Zul'Gurub
Hakkar down! One guild's adventures in Zul'GurubFollow
Scholar
35 posts
Congratulations!
Our guild managed to down the tiger priest on Sunday night for the first time on the absolute last run before pretty much everyone would have been at 0% durability and would have called it a day. This team worked well together and a slight change of tactics for phase two (having one group dedicated to the adds) meant success.
However last night we had 17 / 20 members of the guild with 3 pick ups and it was a complete joke. The pick ups performed perfectly fine probably partly because there were so many of one guild with them. The members of our guild that were present on the successful sunday run listened, worked well together and got the job done. The rest spammed the chat screen when meant to be listening to the raid leader, got us wiped several times on trash mobs, etc, etc. The first time at the snake someone decided to run out when he was at 5% and the second time lots of people started attacking when he still had mana and got killed. I would say the third time luck may have helped a bit and we got him. Then we wiped at the bat and most had had enough. Straight after loads started saying 'oh, i've got homework to do' and you could immediately tell why they weren't focused.
Anyway I got this from the snake so I was happy but a lot of the seasoned raiders were mighty annoyed. Now all I have to do is get to reverred :-(
Our guild managed to down the tiger priest on Sunday night for the first time on the absolute last run before pretty much everyone would have been at 0% durability and would have called it a day. This team worked well together and a slight change of tactics for phase two (having one group dedicated to the adds) meant success.
However last night we had 17 / 20 members of the guild with 3 pick ups and it was a complete joke. The pick ups performed perfectly fine probably partly because there were so many of one guild with them. The members of our guild that were present on the successful sunday run listened, worked well together and got the job done. The rest spammed the chat screen when meant to be listening to the raid leader, got us wiped several times on trash mobs, etc, etc. The first time at the snake someone decided to run out when he was at 5% and the second time lots of people started attacking when he still had mana and got killed. I would say the third time luck may have helped a bit and we got him. Then we wiped at the bat and most had had enough. Straight after loads started saying 'oh, i've got homework to do' and you could immediately tell why they weren't focused.
Anyway I got this from the snake so I was happy but a lot of the seasoned raiders were mighty annoyed. Now all I have to do is get to reverred :-(
ConGrabulations!
We've taken Hakkar down a couple times ourselves. I swear, he's like some ugly Vegas Showgirl from Hell...
-T.
We've taken Hakkar down a couple times ourselves. I swear, he's like some ugly Vegas Showgirl from Hell...
-T.
grats! downing hakkar is always loads of fun. that guy gave me my sword (caresses zinrokh).
on a totally unrelated note....i really recommend getting the hero charm instead of the hero medallion (or whatever the tank trinket is). smoking heart of the mountain+mark of tyranny are far more valuable, and largely better than the zandalar trinket at tanking, if only because theyre full-time buffs, not on-use.
plus i dont think you can activate that trinket in bear form. i could be wrong tho, ive just never seen any info that says druids can use it in bear form (but they can use SOME trinkets in forms, so maybe this is one of those exceptions).
on a totally unrelated note....i really recommend getting the hero charm instead of the hero medallion (or whatever the tank trinket is). smoking heart of the mountain+mark of tyranny are far more valuable, and largely better than the zandalar trinket at tanking, if only because theyre full-time buffs, not on-use.
plus i dont think you can activate that trinket in bear form. i could be wrong tho, ive just never seen any info that says druids can use it in bear form (but they can use SOME trinkets in forms, so maybe this is one of those exceptions).
Grats on Hakkar, very nice comback to raiding considering your story about the splitting and lots of new members. Here is hoping you start getting farther along soon. 
Edit: out of interest how are you guys pulling up the sons?
Edited, Nov 30th 2006 4:33am by Tomec
Edit: out of interest how are you guys pulling up the sons?
Edited, Nov 30th 2006 4:33am by Tomec
i know it wasnt directed at me, but we use a satirically darwinian method of son pulling; lowest dps hunter pulls sons OR the hunter that has pulled aggro most (i.e. the hunter that isnt FDing enough).
or if we're lazy we just have someone go down and grab a son around 45s till the life drain. usually works for us. get enemy natur castbar, it has a very reliable (down to the 10th of a second mark) timer for hakkars life drain, in addition to many other pve encounters (moams stone form for instance).
or if we're lazy we just have someone go down and grab a son around 45s till the life drain. usually works for us. get enemy natur castbar, it has a very reliable (down to the 10th of a second mark) timer for hakkars life drain, in addition to many other pve encounters (moams stone form for instance).
Grats mate! Our guild just downed Vael from BWL for the first time lastnight. So I know how you feel at the moment. Good stuff.
I do not know your feeling of joy, as i have never even entered ZG.
But gosh darn, good for you and your new guild. God its hard for people to just shut up and get along. You guys deserve the kill and the glittering prizes that came along with it!
After all the struggle it was worth it.
And now what are your plans from this point?
But gosh darn, good for you and your new guild. God its hard for people to just shut up and get along. You guys deserve the kill and the glittering prizes that came along with it!
After all the struggle it was worth it.
And now what are your plans from this point?
Grats, Hakkar is a fun fight.
Thank you for all the grats guys! It was certainly a high point for us considering all the crap we've been through recently.
As for pulling the sons...to be honest with you I'm not 100% sure about the timing and stuff as I'm just watching people's health for most of it. As far as I'm aware a hunter will pull one up - I think a bit earlier than necessary - and we keep it sheeped until a raid warning tells the dps to take it out. That's all the details I know really.
Thank you for mentioning that point about the trinket, Quor. I was actually thinking about asking about that in the druid forums. I haven't got Mark Of Tyranny yet as I started raiding before I'd done all the BRS quests and I just haven't had the time to go back and get it. It is very high on my "to do" list though. Unfortunately I'm having trouble finding people to sign up for my groups. As for Smoking Heart of the Mountain...well I can see how good it is but I understand it's BOP and I really don't have the time or the money to level enchanting just for that :(
My reasons for wanting to take the tanking trinket over the spell one is that I'm a feral druid who really needs to improve her feral gear. In our old alliance I wasn't allowed to spend dkp on anything feralish - the melee classes always took priority. So as it stands my healing set is pretty good - I have Stormrage Legs, Will Of Arlokk, Cenarion Robes and Bracers, Heart of the Wild, the epic ZG belt... but my bear and cat sets are all level 50-something blues from Scholo/DM etc. I'm bear-specced at the moment but will probably go all-round feral for levelling again in the expansion.
I know my Insignia Of The Alliance can be used when I'm shapeshifted so I guess I assumed that the ZG trinket would be usable in forms, but I'll definitely need to check that out. It's certainly a difficult decision but such is the life of a druid eh?
Our plans from here...well I imagine getting Arlokk and Hakkar on something approaching farm status is next, as well as trying Jin'Do and the Edge Of Madness bosses. We've also set dates to take a preliminary look at Ony and MC, but I don't know if we'll be able to make up the numbers just yet. I for one am desperate to get back into AQ20 - I hear there's some lovely feral gear in there!
Oh also, Tepetkhet,
That made me giggle. I now have some crazy image in my head of Hakkar emerging onto a stage in a smoky cabaret bar surrounded by dancing girls...
As for pulling the sons...to be honest with you I'm not 100% sure about the timing and stuff as I'm just watching people's health for most of it. As far as I'm aware a hunter will pull one up - I think a bit earlier than necessary - and we keep it sheeped until a raid warning tells the dps to take it out. That's all the details I know really.
Thank you for mentioning that point about the trinket, Quor. I was actually thinking about asking about that in the druid forums. I haven't got Mark Of Tyranny yet as I started raiding before I'd done all the BRS quests and I just haven't had the time to go back and get it. It is very high on my "to do" list though. Unfortunately I'm having trouble finding people to sign up for my groups. As for Smoking Heart of the Mountain...well I can see how good it is but I understand it's BOP and I really don't have the time or the money to level enchanting just for that :(
My reasons for wanting to take the tanking trinket over the spell one is that I'm a feral druid who really needs to improve her feral gear. In our old alliance I wasn't allowed to spend dkp on anything feralish - the melee classes always took priority. So as it stands my healing set is pretty good - I have Stormrage Legs, Will Of Arlokk, Cenarion Robes and Bracers, Heart of the Wild, the epic ZG belt... but my bear and cat sets are all level 50-something blues from Scholo/DM etc. I'm bear-specced at the moment but will probably go all-round feral for levelling again in the expansion.
I know my Insignia Of The Alliance can be used when I'm shapeshifted so I guess I assumed that the ZG trinket would be usable in forms, but I'll definitely need to check that out. It's certainly a difficult decision but such is the life of a druid eh?
Our plans from here...well I imagine getting Arlokk and Hakkar on something approaching farm status is next, as well as trying Jin'Do and the Edge Of Madness bosses. We've also set dates to take a preliminary look at Ony and MC, but I don't know if we'll be able to make up the numbers just yet. I for one am desperate to get back into AQ20 - I hear there's some lovely feral gear in there!
Oh also, Tepetkhet,
Quote:
I swear, he's like some ugly Vegas Showgirl from Hell...
That made me giggle. I now have some crazy image in my head of Hakkar emerging onto a stage in a smoky cabaret bar surrounded by dancing girls...
Wish I could do Zul'Gurub too. Meh, need the last level first!
Your Auto Shot hits Stonetusk Boar for 334.
You have slain Stonetusk Boar!
Stonetusk Boar dies.
I fear I'm not getting much xp from these things.
Please "talk up" if your comprehension white-shifts. I will use simple-happy language-words to help you understand.
Rubytitania the Charming wrote:
I for one am desperate to get back into AQ20 - I hear there's some lovely feral gear in there!
You mean like...*pulls up her profile* these?
Quote:
Oh also, Tepetkhet,
That made me giggle. I now have some crazy image in my head of Hakkar emerging onto a stage in a smoky cabaret bar surrounded by dancing girls...
Quote:
I swear, he's like some ugly Vegas Showgirl from Hell...
That made me giggle. I now have some crazy image in my head of Hakkar emerging onto a stage in a smoky cabaret bar surrounded by dancing girls...
hahaha!
Nice.
-T.
Recent Visitors: 19
All times are in CST
Anonymous Guests (19)
- Forums
- World of Warcraft
- General Discussion
- Hakkar down! One guild's adventures in Zul'Gurub
© 2024 Fanbyte LLC