Breaking new ground
Last night I was able to get online right at 7:30pm and managed to get an invite to the raid. We were doing Doom Lord Kazzak. So I gathered my consumables and flew out to Hellfire Peninsula. Doom Lord is an outdoor raid boss. If he kills someone of your faction he gets healed, and you only have 1 minute to kill him.
Apparently there were some players in the area from another guild and they managed to foul up our attempt. One of the suspects came to the Guild Forums to plead his innocence but some in the guild were not buying it.
After that we flew to Shadowmoon Valley, and took on DoomWalker. Stonegard, the guild's well geared Tankadin was in the raid, and it was awesome to be running with him. It was great to see that he was given an role in tanking for the fight. I know its not my class, it's just my gear/being new.
We were able to get Doomwalker down. I didn't pay much attention to the loots. I can't bid on anything yet and even then I don't have much DKP.
After Doomwalker, a couple of people were asking about a Shattered Halls reputation run. I volunteered to tank. It was me (Prot Paladin), a Rogue, and a Shaman. We picked up a PuG Rogue and a PuG Mage named Synefeld.
Not to brag, but I destroyed the place, AoE tanking nearly everything. The shaman did a great job keeping me up. The only time we used CC was on the Sharpshooters because I didn't want to get scattershot with 4 mobs on me. I can AoE tank, my Shaman healer....not so much.
First boss would not drop my D3 gloves. I guess if there's going to be one piece of D3 that eludes me, the gloves aren't a horrible loss.
The Mage was quite impressed with my tanking. It's always nice to get a positive complement on my tanking.
I headed off to do my dailies, but first I decided to give the Shartuul event a try. I read up and studied the event as much as I could. There is only so much you can learn from reading a strat. At some point, you gotta put in the wipes to learn the fight.
I made it through the first boss okay, and got to the 2nd stage. I was doing fine in the second stage until the large demons started to spawn and then I died.
Not long after McHammerfield, one of the guilds Holy Paladins invited me to go to Karazhan. I get there and I was told I was going to be offtanking. Pitfighter, a Fury Warrior respec'ed to Prot would be Main Tank. Okay, no problem. They still don't know me, trust me yet, but this is Kara. I KNOW I can handle this. How are they supposed to get to trust me/know me if they never try me? However, at this point, I still don't feel comfortable asserting myself. I need to show I can do the job asked of me first, then ask for more responsibility later.
We start off with Nightbane. This fight is an excellent place for a Paladin offtank. There are adds (skeletons) that spawn during the air phase that I can pick up and AoE tank.
First air phase I try to pick up the the adds with Holy Wrath. However, I had never done the fight, so I didn't realize they spawn RIGHT ON TOP OF YOU! They started hitting me and it took forever to get the spell off. By the time it does go off I've lost them and it's general chaos. We recover and continue to beat on the big dragon.
The next air phase, I know what's going on. I lay down a Consecrate and activate Holy Shield. This time I pick up almost all the adds and they go down rather quick. The final air phase goes well also.
I killed a new boss, yet some how it didn't have the same sense of accomplishment it normally does. Odd.
He didn't drop anything I was looking for, so we moved on to Curator. I was chasing flares and taking Hurtful Bolts. The first attempt our DPS was low and the Holy Paladin disconnects. We wipe. Then the Holy Priest ports to Stormwind and becomes a shadow priest. These guys seem to change specs like people change socks. With our new Shadow Priest, and McHammerfeld connected we were able to get him down.
He drops the Rogue, Paladin, Shaman token. No Rogues or Shaman in the raid. The Holy Paladin already has his Tier 4 gloves, so now I am a proud member of the Tier 4 club. I still like my Maiden guantlets better, but for offtank, high threat moments, these will do very nicely.
Next up was Shade of Aran. This was another fight that I had never done. Shade is untankable. He almost never melees, and targets his spells randomly, so I volunteered to don my healing gear for the fight. I chose my PVP healing gear whch has a bit less +heal but more stamina. McHammerfeld was kind enough to put a raid icon Star over his head. He told me, stand on the star and you'll be safe. So that's exactly what I did. I threw heals out on the raid and stood whereever he was standing.
We one shot Aran. He doesn't drop his ring, but I didn't care. Another new boss down, but only for me, not for the guild. Hmm.
We moved on and cleared Chess before calling it a night. I'm not sure if they will finish it tonight (when I'm out of town) or tomorrow night (when I will be back).
It was a pretty cool night. I wish they had let me do some actual main tanking so I could show them I can handle it, but I'll have to be patient. I know they let Paladin's tank even in 25 mans, so I'll get my shot at some point.
Apparently there were some players in the area from another guild and they managed to foul up our attempt. One of the suspects came to the Guild Forums to plead his innocence but some in the guild were not buying it.
After that we flew to Shadowmoon Valley, and took on DoomWalker. Stonegard, the guild's well geared Tankadin was in the raid, and it was awesome to be running with him. It was great to see that he was given an role in tanking for the fight. I know its not my class, it's just my gear/being new.
We were able to get Doomwalker down. I didn't pay much attention to the loots. I can't bid on anything yet and even then I don't have much DKP.
After Doomwalker, a couple of people were asking about a Shattered Halls reputation run. I volunteered to tank. It was me (Prot Paladin), a Rogue, and a Shaman. We picked up a PuG Rogue and a PuG Mage named Synefeld.
Not to brag, but I destroyed the place, AoE tanking nearly everything. The shaman did a great job keeping me up. The only time we used CC was on the Sharpshooters because I didn't want to get scattershot with 4 mobs on me. I can AoE tank, my Shaman healer....not so much.
First boss would not drop my D3 gloves. I guess if there's going to be one piece of D3 that eludes me, the gloves aren't a horrible loss.
The Mage was quite impressed with my tanking. It's always nice to get a positive complement on my tanking.
I headed off to do my dailies, but first I decided to give the Shartuul event a try. I read up and studied the event as much as I could. There is only so much you can learn from reading a strat. At some point, you gotta put in the wipes to learn the fight.
I made it through the first boss okay, and got to the 2nd stage. I was doing fine in the second stage until the large demons started to spawn and then I died.
Not long after McHammerfield, one of the guilds Holy Paladins invited me to go to Karazhan. I get there and I was told I was going to be offtanking. Pitfighter, a Fury Warrior respec'ed to Prot would be Main Tank. Okay, no problem. They still don't know me, trust me yet, but this is Kara. I KNOW I can handle this. How are they supposed to get to trust me/know me if they never try me? However, at this point, I still don't feel comfortable asserting myself. I need to show I can do the job asked of me first, then ask for more responsibility later.
We start off with Nightbane. This fight is an excellent place for a Paladin offtank. There are adds (skeletons) that spawn during the air phase that I can pick up and AoE tank.
First air phase I try to pick up the the adds with Holy Wrath. However, I had never done the fight, so I didn't realize they spawn RIGHT ON TOP OF YOU! They started hitting me and it took forever to get the spell off. By the time it does go off I've lost them and it's general chaos. We recover and continue to beat on the big dragon.
The next air phase, I know what's going on. I lay down a Consecrate and activate Holy Shield. This time I pick up almost all the adds and they go down rather quick. The final air phase goes well also.
I killed a new boss, yet some how it didn't have the same sense of accomplishment it normally does. Odd.
He didn't drop anything I was looking for, so we moved on to Curator. I was chasing flares and taking Hurtful Bolts. The first attempt our DPS was low and the Holy Paladin disconnects. We wipe. Then the Holy Priest ports to Stormwind and becomes a shadow priest. These guys seem to change specs like people change socks. With our new Shadow Priest, and McHammerfeld connected we were able to get him down.
He drops the Rogue, Paladin, Shaman token. No Rogues or Shaman in the raid. The Holy Paladin already has his Tier 4 gloves, so now I am a proud member of the Tier 4 club. I still like my Maiden guantlets better, but for offtank, high threat moments, these will do very nicely.
Next up was Shade of Aran. This was another fight that I had never done. Shade is untankable. He almost never melees, and targets his spells randomly, so I volunteered to don my healing gear for the fight. I chose my PVP healing gear whch has a bit less +heal but more stamina. McHammerfeld was kind enough to put a raid icon Star over his head. He told me, stand on the star and you'll be safe. So that's exactly what I did. I threw heals out on the raid and stood whereever he was standing.
We one shot Aran. He doesn't drop his ring, but I didn't care. Another new boss down, but only for me, not for the guild. Hmm.
We moved on and cleared Chess before calling it a night. I'm not sure if they will finish it tonight (when I'm out of town) or tomorrow night (when I will be back).
It was a pretty cool night. I wish they had let me do some actual main tanking so I could show them I can handle it, but I'll have to be patient. I know they let Paladin's tank even in 25 mans, so I'll get my shot at some point.
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